Meet Frank. He’s a cranky neighbor who I disturbed while he was having breakfast yesterday. I see him often because I regularly walk through what he considers to be his property.
Frank treats my visits as trespassing and he lets me know that I’m not welcome by hurling at me the vilest curses I’ve ever heard. I try to tell him that the Town considers my wife and I to be the owners of his habitat and taxes us considerably for the honor. He rejects that reasoning as typical human colonizer talk, not worthy of anything more than a screech and a growl.
Of course, Frank is a fellow mammal whose ancestors were here before the Mayflower ran aground. But, he does do some squirrely things. For example, before and after his little snack yesterday he was very active foraging and burying food as if there were a cold spell coming.
(Red squirrel image taken in Brooklin, Maine, on November 26, 2024.)