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Excerpts from the Introduction to the Outwitting Squirrels II

Outwitting Squirrels

101 Cunning Stratagems to Reduce Dramatically the Egregious Misappropriation of Seed From Your Birdfeeder by Squirrels

by Bill Adler, Jr.

Chicago Review Press, 2nd edition, 1996

"I love this book. Go buy this book. Bill Adler, Jr. is my hero."
--Rosie O'Donnell

Over 1 Million Squirrels Outwitted!

I caught myself feeding a squirrel the other day.

Indeed a lot has changed since 1987, when I first wrote Outwitting Squirrels.

But first let me say flatly that I have not become soft on squirrels. There is nothing in the behavior of squirrels to have changed my mind that squirrels are

just common thieves shrouded in fur and with cute, fluffy tails. If you feed birds—beautiful, majestic, creatures of the wind—then you must also curse squirrels. And work to outwit them.

But first, let me explain what appears to be a transgression on my part. I can understand that if my offering peanuts to squirrels (actually a single squirrel, but I’ll get into that for a moment) looks to you as if I have joined with evil itself. In fact, it does send shivers down my spine to see anyone offering a nut to one of these creatures.

But since 1987 a lot has happened to me—namely, I have children.

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Certainly I agree that small children and squirrels don’t mix (squirrels bite, they carry fleas, and they teach bad manners), but it’s hard to resist your five-year-old daughter when she looks out the kitchen window and then pleads into your eyes: "Daddy, it’s Bushy’s cousin. Can we give a peanut?" Karen’s a red-head and that makes her even harder to say no to her. (Karen’s pre-school has a feeding station set up for their resident squirrel, Bushy, so this one, to Karen, had to be Bushy’s cousin. I intend to talk with the school’s head soon about teaching their pupils about squirrel-feeding.)

So I gave Bushy’s cousin a peanut. Karen and her little sister, Claire, squealed with delight. The jumped up and down and insisted that I lift them on top of the counter so that they could get a better look at Bushy’s cousin. They Karen said, "Could he have another peanut? He looks so hungry." And Claire, her two-and-a-half-year-old sister said, "Cn her ‘nother pinut? Her hukgry." I complied. As you can image, one nut led to another and soon I was shuffling in and out in my slippers in the winter, giving the squirrel unearned peanuts. Karen and Claire loved it. They stuck their noses right against the window and watched the squirrel pick the nut up in his little hand-like claws and nibble the nut to nothingness. At first Bushy’s cousin was apprehensive (he must have heard about Karen and Claire’s reputation for chasing their grandmother’s cat around her house), but after a short time, Bushy’s cousin realized that the glass between him and them was impenetrable—he was safe.

Eventually we ran out of peanuts, though my kids had a great time. And I have to admit, it was a little more enjoyable that sitting with them a watching Barney. Still, the nuts cost about $3 and that could have gone a long way toward feeding the blue jays who also seemed in need of food. When we ran out of peanuts, Karen suggested peanut butter. (I guarantee that she didn’t learn that from me!) So for the next few days, Bushy’s cousin dined on Carr’s crackers with peanut butter. As you can imagine, once children like something, they never want it to end, or so it seems to us adults. But eventually, Karen and Claire lost interest in Bushy’s cousin, and we went back to Barney, who, despite all his flaws, doesn’t raid birdfeeders.

In the spirit of things, I guess it’s important to come completely clean about my squirrel affairs. There was this one other time, I forget exactly when, but I think it was in 1990, that I was caught in the act of feeding a squirrels. Squirrels, plural, actually—and I was caught on film. It happened like this. Our local CBS affiliate was doing a program on rogue squirrels, and they asked if I would like to be interviewed. Naturally, the program wouldn’t be any good without squirrels, so I had to conjure up a few, which is itself no problem, because all one has to do is toss out a few peanuts and squirrels will come running. That’s what I did: Tossed out a few nuts and a hoard of squirrels came running. There was a feeding frenzy. All of a sudden every squirrel for miles was in our yard. If I had been swimming off the coast of Australia and had done the same kind of thing with sharks around, I wouldn’t be here today, or at the very least, I’d be typing with my elbows. That’s how ferocious these squirrels were. Just the faintest wisp of and peanut aroma and they become aggressive, maniac varmints. The filming went well, though some of the squirrels seemed to consider the possibility that I was keeping a stash of peanuts in my pants’ legs. The show filmed me on the deck in my backyard, and to facilitate getting more nuts we kept the kitchen door open. You probably know where this is heading: The next thing I knew I was chasing this squirrel around my kitchen using a roll of paper towels to urge him to seek safety outside. And the camera man was hot on my heels.

How humiliating. But perhaps more than anything this incident has increased my resolve to perpetuate the good research around the world that has gone into outwitting squirrels. Since 1987 the Internet has come to be, and that, more than any single other instrument has improved our capability to thwart squirrels. The Internet has facilitated the rapid exchange of information about squirrels. Information can be transmitted through the Net faster than squirrels can run. Although there have been reports of squirrels chewing through phone lines to sabotage our lines of communications, I don’t think that squirrels have yet learned how valuable the Internet has become. (One Netzian disagreed. To one of my queries he wrote: "Go ahead. Put all your best tricks on the Internet where the International Squirrels Who Raid Birdfeeders Association can download them for research in ways to overcome them!")

I’ve learned a lot about squirrels over the past years. For example, did you know that squirrels in some areas of the country are smarter than others. One person who read the original Outwitting Squirrels wrote that her metal feeder with a spring-loaded door works "brilliantly for Tennessee squirrels, but there are a few high IQ Washington, DC ones that have figured out a way to suspend themselves spread-eagle across the top of the feeder with one paw free to reach down, without pressure and help themselves to the seed." Makes sense to me that squirrels would be better at being squirrels when in close proximity with so many politicians.

I have long felt that this is more that a matter of squirrels versus birds. Ultimately, both squirrels and birds will thrive, and neither really needs humans. (Though, who would squirrels harass if we weren’t here—cats?) But I believe that our battle against squirrels must endure, because if we can’t figure out a way to outwit squirrels how can we ever expect to get a man or woman to Mars?

--Bill Adler, Jr.

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The Outwitting Series™ is a trademark of Bill Adler, Jr. The Outwitting books include: Outwitting Squirrels, Outwitting Critters, Outwitting Deer, Outwitting the Neighbors, Outwitting Toddlers and others.