The Pumpkin - Summer Update, post #25!

[Karen]

Once upon a time, there was a fundraiser called "The Pumpkin Patch" at a local church. I spoke to the pastor, and learned it was a joint fundraiser both for that church, and for the Native American tribe in either Arizona or New Mexico who had grown the pumpkins and shipped them across the country by truck. Each day, the church would call the tribe, report how much money they made that day, and the tribe would know they'd get half. I was surprised that they trucked pumpkins all this way and still made a profit! But after conferring with the pastor, who assured me that it was, indeed, a Sincere Pumpkin Patch, I decided to buy a pumpkin there. We got a good, big one - it was probably 16-18 inches high, and 14 inches across - a good armful of pumpkin.

Mind you, we buy a pumpkin each year mentally referring to it as "the Squirrel Treat" and set it out on the front stairs leading up to the porch, a couple weeks before Halloween. This year, as of Halloween, our pumpkin was un-nibbled, but there were carved jack-o-lanterns to nibble in the neighborhood.

Then, before Thanksgiving, the nibbles appeared. A hole was chewed into the pumpkin, and the suirrel would sit inside, poking her head out every few seconds to make sure it was still safe. Then the squirrel started little nibbles on the outside, once all the seeds were gone inside.

Last week, the day after Thanksgiving, Paul suggested we moved the now-slightly-less-attractive pumpkin to the back yard. I was a little concerned the squirrels wouldn't find it ...

Pictures from today, I needn't have worried.

http://petoftheday.com/online/karen/s/Begins.jpg
Squirrell makes a small mark in the orange outer flesh

http://petoftheday.com/online/karen/s/StillWorking.jpg
Still working, you can see the mark is now much bigger

http://petoftheday.com/online/karen/s/OnTop.jpg
Now you can see the large area, and how, um ... pudgy ... she has gotten!

[Ginger's Mom]

Oh my gosh, how cute. How long was she there eating? Should I check the decorative pumpkins in front of my place for nibbles? I think I would enjoy watching a squirrel chow down on one of our pumpkins (although I am sure Ginger would be screaming her head off at it the whole time).

[Killearn Kitties]

That squirrel looks as though she may have found quite a few pumpkins!
What a cute visitor. :D

[gini]

Oh Karen, what wonderful photos. But she's not fat - she's just fluffy - she must have eaten the whipped cream off of the pumpkin first!!

[Karen]

There was no whipped cream, but there were lots of seeds inside at the beginning! That spot she started in the first photo now goes about 8 inches wide!

She has a nice bushy, healthy-looking tail, and she is still wary enough to dash for the biggest tree if one of us goes outside ...

She eats for maybe ten minutes at a time before heading for safety, then comes back a while later. The third photo was taken a couple hours after the first two, when she had come back for more!

[Laura's Babies]

That is just so cute!! Makes me want to go out and buy a pumpkin! (place it so the kitties can watch with a good view, of coarse)

[cyber-sibes]

Aw, she's so cute! That's a great idea, Karen... A pre-stocked pantry!

[Edwina's Secretary]

Shirley was a pumpkin-eater too....



http://www.imagestation.com/picture/sraid86/pe9b75f5fa292f6b189896fa034365590/faacd09b.jpg
http://www.imagestation.com/picture/sraid86/pa8fad303ead267b484c19b0cc76c663a/faacd0d6.jpg
It was so cute when only her tail would be hanging out the hole she carved!

[jennielynn1970]

http://petoftheday.com/online/karen/s/OnTop.jpg

Squirrels totally freak me out, but she is absolutely adorable! Look at those little fingers of hers!!

I used to go to a peanut shop in Bethlehem when I lived there, and buy bags of fresh roasted peanuts. I lived down the hill from "God's Acre", which was the old Moravian cemetary there, and actually has the last Mohican buried in there (so the story goes). I went there one day, and there were a couple squirrels around, so I threw out some peanuts in shells for them. Within about 2 minutes I was completely surrounded by about 30+ squirrels! :eek: :eek: All I saw were these black, beady eyes, and those little fingers and they kept getting closer and closer! I absolutely lost it!! I screamed, threw the bag of peanuts down on the ground, and ran out of God's Acre and back to my apartment, lol. These suckers were huge, and I swore they were going to swarm and attack me for the peanuts, lol. I still get jittery around squirrels, and I never sit in the park and feed them peanuts anymore!! :o

[Karen]

Shirley was a pumpkin-eater too....
It was so cute when only her tail would be hanging out the hole she carved!

Hmm, is it me, or does Shirley look pretty darned small compared to Squirrell? Hmmmm .... Maybe you had a diet pumpkin?

[Cinder & Smoke]

Squirrels totally freak me out ...

I was completely surrounded by about 30+ squirrels! :eek: :eek:

... black, beady eyes, and those little fingers ...

I screamed, threw the bag of peanuts down on the ground, and ran out of God's Acre ...
These suckers were huge, and I swore they were going to swarm and attack me for the peanuts ... :o

OMG!

And WE'RE supposed to be the Superior Creatures on the Planet?

:rolleyes:
:p
:D

[pitc9]

OMG!

And WE'RE supposed to be the Superior Creatures on the Planet?

:rolleyes:
:p
:D

LOL! True! But that was a funny story! I did something like that once at the beach with chips and seagulls! :o

Karen, those pictures are too cute! She sure looks like she's ready for winter with all that extra insulation! :D
As for Shirley...I think she just doesn't over indulge like Squirrell does! :p

[Cincy'sMom]

Cute pictures!!!


Squirrels can get quite demanding when they are used to a food source. At my old job, we use to put out sunflower seeds for teh Squireels. We'd make several piles so each squirrel could have their own, as when we lumped them all together there seeme to be squibbles between them. We had names for several of them, and honestly could tell most fo the group a part. They got used to us and knew where the food was coming from, so in the morning, they would be waiting. The front fo thebuilding has big glass windowns, and I kid you not, they would KNOCK ON THE WINDOW looking for a second helping!

[Ginger's Mom]

I think Shirley has a little squirrel gym in another part of the yard. ;)

[lizbud]

A cute idea for the lucky squirrels. :) I dare not tempt the ones around
my yard though. Maggie would go crazy & it wouldn't be fair to the little
critters.

[Chica]

THAT IS SO ADORABLE WHAT THE SQUIRREL LOOKS LIKE AFTER EATING THE PUMPKIN. :)

[jennielynn1970]

LOL! True! But that was a funny story! I did something like that once at the beach with chips and seagulls! :o

Now that you mention it, I'm like that with those big geese we have in the parks. They have the white bands around their necks... not sure what they are called. They freak me out too, lol. They are just so brazen, and have no fear of humans what so ever, and almost demand what ever it is that you have. I loved Fairmount Park in Phila., but those suckers were everywhere!

[Karen]

They are Canada geese! The ones at the "duck feeding area" near here can be kinda obnoxious, if you let them. I had one even nip my fingers taking bread from me!

Squirrell has made much more progress on the pumpkin, but I didn't catch her at it today. I'll try for another picture tomorrow, if the weather isn't too awful for her to be out nibbling!

[IRescue452]

I didn't even know squirrels ate pumpkins. And we have a good two dozen pumpkins around the yard every year. I guess we'd better stop feeding them seeds and nuts and see if they go for pumpkin.

Canadian geese scare me. If you've ever watched a herd, they act just like small raptors. They fight and bite and hiss. My mom doesn't mind getting surrounded by a few hundred when we go to the bird sanctuary, but I run. I've seen the results of goose bites. They take chunks out. And I've had the joys of being chased by an angry goose when I got too close to his family. He flew at me like a bat out of hell. I'm waiting for them to go extinct.

[jennielynn1970]

Canadian geese scare me. If you've ever watched a herd, they act just like small raptors. They fight and bite and hiss. My mom doesn't mind getting surrounded by a few hundred when we go to the bird sanctuary, but I run. I've seen the results of goose bites. They take chunks out. And I've had the joys of being chased by an angry goose when I got too close to his family. He flew at me like a bat out of hell. I'm waiting for them to go extinct.

Glad I'm not the only one who feels this way!! I know I'm weird, but sometimes I'm just not sure how weird. Now I'm feeling more normal, lol.

I still can't walk down the back road at my mom and dad's place without diverting to the middle of the road for about 1/2 mile. I had a groundhog run out of the brush on the side of the road, snarling and foaming at the mouth, and she chased my butt so far down that road! I never thought I would see a groundhog run so damn fast! My dad said she was probably protecting babies. I said she was rabid. The ones in our parks down here just lay in the grass and sun themselves and look cute. The one I had chase me was nothing even close to cute. Whoever said growing up on a farm was such fun and you learned so much.... they needed to grow up on our farm! Dealing with all the critters and creepy crawlies and stuff, all it did was make me appreciate city living.

[Logan]

I was just wondering what I was going to do with my pumpkin. Hate to throw it away since it still looks good. I think I've just found my answer thanks to Karen and Sara! :) Do I need to start a hole in it or will they just tear into it by themselves?

[Karen]

No need to start a hole - they do that themselves!

[Edwina's Secretary]

:D :D :D I had intended to carve the pumpkin when Shirley and Family beat me to it! Once I realized she could do a better job than I...I left it to her.

Here no squirrels.... :( :( My pumpkin finished the season untouched by cute little paws.... :( :(

[Cataholic]

This was the first year our pumpkin was eaten by squirrels! Jonah was totally crushed to find teethmarks in his pumpkin. He cried and cried. Then, I told him how hungry the squirrels were, and this was a good thing, and I turned the eaten part around to another less obvious side.

[Karen]

Remember this thread? Well, Squirrell didn't eat ALL the seeds, she apparently planted one. Three days ago, I noticed something orange out my kitchen window, and when I went out and over to it, it was a flower from the smallest, most anemic-looking pumpkin plant I have ever seen. I wanted to take a picture of it to show you all, but it has rained every day since then.

So today, I went out with the camera, and - hey, no flower, in fact 4 inches of stem were gone. Drats, I thought, one of the neighborhood's kids must have picked it! I went inside to tell Paul, and he said "Nope! Early this morning I looked out and there was the wild bunny, in just that spot. I wondered what he was eating - must have been the pumpkin flower!"

So there will be no eentsy weentsy pumpkin this fall. But Squireel tried!

It's a very, very, very shady spot - moss grows well there. The leaves on a pumpkin plant are normally bigger than my hand - the few remaining on this one are maybe an inch and a half wide at the widest. It's amazing the thing made it as far as blossoming!

[Cinder & Smoke]

Well, Squirrell didn't eat ALL the seeds, she apparently planted one.

"Nope! Early this morning I looked out and there was the wild bunny,
in just that spot. I wondered what he was eating -
must have been the pumpkin flower!"

:)

Sounds to me like a certian lil brown Hoppy Bridge Bunny sent an Angel Bunny down
to check on Mom & Dad at the ole Homestead.

You Guys prolly earned a 5***** Rating for the Snack Bar.

:D

[dukedogsmom]

:)

Sounds to me like a certian lil brown Hoppy Bridge Bunny sent an Angel Bunny down
to check on Mom & Dad at the ole Homestead.

You Guys prolly earned a 5***** Rating for the Snack Bar.

:D
That was my first thought, as well! Maybe they'll see more of the wild bunny.