A Strange Encounter!

This isn't a geocaching story, but I thought it was worth putting in a blog!

A Strange Encounter!                 9/14/11

We had the most unusual afternoon in our own backyard. 

As I was getting the gas grill ready to cook some burgers, I noticed our bluebird bird house had some straw poking out of the entrance hole.  I walk up to it to have a look and can see that something has chewed the opening to make it bigger.  Of course, I thought it was a squirrel trying to get in to get at eggs.  I called Jim out to come have a look.  He came out of the house and as he was looking at the bird house he said, “I cleaned that house out not too long ago.”

I said, “Really?”  He said, “I cleaned out both bird houses.”  We have two bluebird bird houses in our back yard and have always enjoyed watching the little families come and go.  I told him this was September and past time for birds to be raising babies.  So, he got a long stick from the yard and tapped on the house so see if a bird would fly out.  Nothing happened.  He tapped some more and opened the front door.  It was packed with nesting materials – all the way up to the entrance hole of the house!  Plus, ants started pour out of the nest.  We are shocked to see such building materials in the nest like string, fresh green leaves and straw!  Jim decides to poke the nest with his stick.  Then he says, “This could be a bat’s nest.”  Huh?  Bats don’t build nests, do they?  At this point, I’m starting to back up.  If this is a bat’s nest, I don’t want to be close if this thing flies out.  I said, “We should go in and Google a bat’s nest.”   Jim is still poking around with his stick and then says excitedly, “There is something in there! It’s weird!  I don’t know what it is!  It looked alien!”  Oh my gosh, something alien living in our bird house?  I’m heading for the back deck now!  He pokes the nest until it falls out of the bird house.  He was right!  There is something in that nest and it’s moving around on the ground!  Whatever it is, didn’t fly off, so I go back to get a closer look.  There are babies on the ground and moving.  All of a sudden, something bigger does jump out of the nest and lands on the tree close by!  Jim said, “It is a bat!”  I move around the tree to get a closer look and to me it looks like a squirrel or a chipmunk!  I said, “No, it has a tail!” 

At this point, I run into the house and grab a camera!  Jim is still outside keeping the dogs away from the babies on the ground.  There looks to be three or four of them and they are crawling around.

I slowly come around the tree to where the momma thing is and snap a picture.  Then she leaps to the ground and goes to one of the babies.  As she is moving around, it does look like she has wings!  But, I just don’t think it’s a bat.  Jim and I watch closely as she maneuvers the baby just right, then she jumps onto a nearby pine tree and scampers up to almost the top.  Just then, she leaps into the air and looks like she is flying!  Oh my God, it’s a flying squirrel!  We are stunned!  We have lived here for over eight years and have never seen a flying squirrel in our neighborhood, much less in our own backyard!

We are trying to keep up with where she goes, but we loose her in the tree tops.  We are also, keeping the dogs away from the remaining babies.  Now, we feel badly that we have disturbed a mother nesting on her babies!  While the mother is gone, Jim decides to try to put the nest back and put the babies back in it.  He puts some garden gloves on and puts the nest, as best he could, back into the birdhouse.  He picks up two of the babies and tries to get them back into the nest, but they won’t let go of his glove.  I’m watching out for the momma squirrel, in case she comes back and decides to attack.  You just don’t know about these things! 

Sure enough, she flies back down to the tree next to the bird house.  I warn Jim and he quickly gets away from the area.  We watch her do the same thing with the next baby.  She positions it and leaps to the same tree she skirted up the first time, goes to the top and makes a flying leap to another tree farther way.  It really does look like she is flying! 

It’s not long until she is back after another baby!  This is survival instinct at its best!  She is determined to save her family from an unexpected eviction of her home.  She has found an alternative safe place in the tree tops somewhere. 

Thinking she was gone with her family, I ask Jim to get the grill going and I go back into the house to actually think about supper again!  I get the burgers and a plate and place them on the grill.  I go back in to tend to other parts of the meal and I hear this tapping on glass.  It’s Jim on the other side of the deck, quietly trying to get my attention.  I go out the other door and he said, “She’s back!”  There was one more baby that had crawled quite a distance away from the nest.  She gets this last baby attached to her and scurries up the tree closest to the deck.  We again watch with amazement at her abilities to fly through the back yard with a baby on her tiny little body.  As she is flying from tree top to tree, there is a big scuffle in the trees!  A red tail hawk has also been interested in the movements of this little flying squirrel and decided it was supper!  We can’t make out for sure what is happening, but there is a lot of commotion, squawking and trembling limbs!  It looks like the little momma flying squirrel has gotten away from the hawk because we see her flying away to another tree and there seems to be a regular squirrel fighting off the hawk!  Wow!   We can’t believe nature’s drama in our back yard on a Wednesday evening even if we did inadvertently cause it!