We all want our gardens to attract wildlife. In theory. But when it comes down to it we’re rather specific about which are welcome and how we expect them to behave (same as with family and friends). Meanwhile wildlife has its own agenda and, apparently, little regard for ours. It’s perfectly natural that sometimes the peace unravels.
The first deer and bunnies to timidly approach your Eden are adorable real-life visions of Bambi and Thumper. The new homeowner’s universal response is to melt like butter, call the kids and then muscle the kids out of the way to get a picture.
A year later, a different universal response: bursting out the backdoor waving a meat cleaver and screaming like a lunatic to chase them off. That’s what having hundreds of dollars of hostas devoured and your saplings mangled will do to a previously sane person.
I’d say bring on some bears and cougars to knock the population down, but then we’d have bears and cougars lurking around with agendas of their own. With wildlife, you see, it’s a case of being careful what you wish for.
Deer are exasperating but squirrels are worse. Oh, sure, they’re cute. But wouldn’t they be just as cute depicted in books about dinosaurs and other extinct species? Here’s what I want to know: How did an animal so notorious for indecision when crossing the road somehow piece together the complex, intricate and interconnected steps to arrive at and break into a carefully sited, expertly engineered bird feeder?
Their secret, I’m convinced, is that they have time. Nothing but time. And determination. And, apparently, quite a hankering for bird feed. So all day every day, while we’re out working, running errands and otherwise burdening ourselves with responsibilities, there the squirrels are. Scheming. And conditioning themselves to jump farther, grip tighter, hang upside down longer and stuff their chubby little cheeks fuller until, one day, you look out and there’s the squirrel version of a test pilot dangling from your bird feeder, gorging itself.
Worse, all the other squirrels, appearing all innocent and half starved (as if they hadn’t spent the day taking one bite each out of every one of your tomatoes), have been studiously watching this tutorial.
Nothing proves we’re part of nature more than the utter lack of harmony you feel at that moment.
Harmony in nature? That’s a ruse. It’s all a battle. You bursting out the door waving a knife at squirrels is almost the same as a pack of wolves defending its turf. Maybe we can take some solace in that. We’re at the top of the food chain and yet somehow powerless to prevent squirrels from raiding our bird feeders—but maybe, ultimately, hopefully, we’re just fattening them up for the hawks. In a sense, we are doing exactly what we set out to do: Feed the birds.
Illustration by Tom Beuerlein
