A week ago today I posted that a squirrel had built a nest on our bathroom window ledge. A day after that post, the whole nest was knocked down. I figured Non Birding Bill did that to encourage our guest to room elsewhere. When I asked him about it, he said that he thought I took it down. We both figured the squirrel got tired of us and our showering and scrapped the idea.
Tonight while vegging on the couch and watching an old movie we heard chewing. NBB shouted, "Oy, bunny butthead, knock it off." I realized the sound didn't come from Cinnamon's direction. We looked in the bathroom and sure enough a squirrel is back. Is the same one as last week? Is it a new guy who watched the squirrel last week and is deciding to give the ledge a go? What are we going to do about it? The answer to all three questions is "Who knows?" Anyway, that's him pictured above rennovating tonight.
Also, in same post, I mentioned that I was going to use the female merlin at The Raptor Center for program and she had just taken a bath. Well, it happened again this week (note drenched merlin at left)! This time I got a photo while she was uber wet.
Kinda hard to take that seriously as nature's perfect killing machine, huh? This is what a dry merlin should look like. Maybe they should try hunting this way. I don't think prey would take them seriously.
Last week I also mentioned that I was drying out a black-crowned night-heron foot at my office for use as an educational tool. I was led to believe that this would be a fairly painless process...I was led astray. The foot has been getting stinkier by the day. I figured I should get some kind of odor absorber so as not to offend my office mates at TRC. I picked up some mango/orange gel thingie and stuck that into the same cabinet as I have the foot. Today, they guy who has a desk next to mine asked, "What is that smell in your office?"
"Here it comes," I thought, "he can smell that nasty foot."
"It smells great!" He exclaimed.
Apparently the mango/orange thingie is a hit. People keep walking by asking, "Oh! what smells so good?"
Little do they know the aromatic evil that lies beneath.
Speaking of evil, can you id the bird that is stalking me in this photo on the left?
I don't know if I would hire this great horned owl for undercover work.