Psychotic Squirrels

I am watching the silly squirrels in my back yard. Why are they behaving that way?

They throw themselves up in the air and flip over ... then squirm all around. They do this repeatedly

I never dreamed slowly cruising through a residential neighborhood could be so incredibly dangerous! Studies have shown that motorcycling requires more decisions per second, and more sheer data processing than nearly any other common activity or sport. The reactions and accurate decision making abilities needed have been likened to the reactions of fighter pilots! The consequences of bad decisions or poor situational awareness are pretty much the same for both groups too.

Occasionally, as a rider I have caught myself starting to make bad or late decisions while riding. In flight training, my instructors called this being “behind the power curve”. It is a mark of experience that when this begins to happen, the rider recognizes the situation, and more importantly, does something about it. A short break, a meal, or even a gas stop can set things right again as it gives the brain a chance to catch up.

Good, accurate, and timely decisions are essential when riding a motorcycle.at least if you want to remain among the living. In short, the brain needs to keep up with the machine.

I had been banging around the roads of east Texas and as I headed back into Dallas, found myself in very heavy, high-speed traffic on the freeways. Normally, this is not a problem, I commute in these conditions daily, but suddenly I was nearly run down by a cage that decided it needed my lane more than I did. This is not normally a big deal either, as it happens around here often, but usually I can accurately predict which drivers are not paying attention and avoid them before we are even close. This one I missed seeing until it was nearly too late, and as I took evasive action I nearly broadsided another car that I was not even aware was there!

Two bad decisions and insufficient situational awareness.all within seconds. I was behind the power curve. Time to get off the freeway. I hit the next exit, and as I was in an area I knew pretty well, headed through a few big residential neighborhoods as a new route home. As I turned onto the nearly empty streets I opened the visor on my full-face helmet to help get some air. I figured some slow riding through the quiet surface streets would give me time to relax, think, and regain that “edge” so frequently required when riding. Little did I suspect.

As I passed an oncoming car, a brown furry missile shot out from under it and tumbled to a stop immediately in front of me. It was a squirrel, and must have been trying to run across the road when it encountered the car. I really was not going very fast, but there was no time to brake or avoid it-it was that close.

I hate to run over animals.and I really hate it on a motorcycle, but a squirrel should pose no danger to me. I barely had time to brace for the impact.

Animal lovers, never fear. Squirrels can take care of themselves!

Inches before impact, the squirrel flipped to his feet. He was standing on his hind legs and facing the oncoming Valkyrie with steadfast resolve in his little beady eyes. His mouth opened, and at the last possible second, he screamed and leapt! I am pretty sure the scream was squirrel for, “Banzai!” or maybe, “Die you gravy-sucking, heathen scum!” as the leap was spectacular and he flew over the windshield and impacted me squarely in the chest.

Instantly he set upon me. If I did not know better I would have sworn he brought twenty of his little buddies along for the attack. Snarling, hissing, and tearing at my clothes, he was a frenzy of activity. As I was dressed only in a light t-shirt, summer riding gloves, and jeans this was a bit of a cause for concern. This furry little tornado was doing some damage!

Picture a large man on a huge black and chrome cruiser, dressed in jeans, a t-shirt, and leather gloves puttering maybe 25mph down a quiet residential street.and in the fight of his life with a squirrel. And losing.

I grabbed for him with my left hand and managed to snag his tail. With all my strength I flung the evil rodent off the left of the bike, almost running into the right curb as I recoiled from the throw.

That should have done it. The matter should have ended right there. It really should have. The squirrel could have sailed into one of the pristinely kept yards and gone on about his business, and I could have headed home. No one would have been the wiser. But this was no ordinary squirrel. This was not even an ordinary pissed-off squirrel. This was an evil attack squirrel of death!

Somehow he caught my gloved finger with one of his little hands, and with the force of the throw swung around and with a resounding thump and an amazing impact he landed square on my back and resumed his rather anti-social and extremely distracting activities. He also managed to take my left glove with him!

The situation was not improved. Not improved at all. His attacks were continuing, and now I could not reach him. I was startled to say the least. The combination of the force of the throw, only having one hand (the throttle hand) on the handlebars, and my jerking back unfortunately put a healthy twist through my right hand and into the throttle. A healthy twist on the throttle of a Valkyrie can only have one result. Torque. This is what the Valkyrie is made for, and she is very, very good at it. The engine roared as the front wheel left the pavement. The squirrel screamed in anger. The Valkyrie screamed in ecstasy. I screamed in.well.I just plain screamed.

Now picture a large man on a huge black and chrome cruiser, dressed in jeans, a slightly squirrel torn t-shirt, and only one leather glove roaring at maybe 70mph and rapidly accelerating down a quiet residential street.on one wheel and with a demonic squirrel on his back. The man and the squirrel are both screaming bloody murder.

With the sudden acceleration I was forced to put my other hand back on the handlebars and try to get control of the bike. This was leaving the mutant squirrel to his own devices, but I really did not want to crash into somebody’s tree, house, or parked car. Also, I had not yet figured out how to release the throttle.my brain was just simply overloaded. I did manage to mash the back brake, but it had little affect against the massive power of the big cruiser.

About this time the squirrel decided that I was not paying sufficient attention to this very serious battle (maybe he is a Scottish attack squirrel of death), and he came around my neck and got IN my full-face helmet with me. As the faceplate closed partway and he began hissing in my face I am quite sure my screaming changed tone and intensity. It seemed to have little affect on the squirrel however. The rpm’s on The Dragon maxed out (I was not concerned about shifting at the moment) and her front end started to drop. Now picture the large man on the huge black and chrome cruiser, dressed in jeans, a very ragged torn t-shirt, and wearing one leather glove, roaring at probably 80mph, still on one wheel, with a large puffy squirrel’s tail sticking out his mostly closed full-face helmet. By now the screams are probably getting a little hoarse.

Finally I got the upper hand.I managed to grab his tail again, pulled him out of my helmet, and slung him to the left as hard as I could. This time it worked.sort-of. Spectacularly sort-of, so to speak.

Picture the scene. You are a cop. You and your partner have pulled off on a quiet residential street and parked with your windows down to do some paperwork.

Suddenly a large man on a huge black and chrome cruiser, dressed in jeans, a torn t-shirt flapping in the breeze, and wearing one leather glove, moving at probably 80mph on one wheel, and screaming bloody murder roars by and with all his strength throws a live squirrel grenade directly into your police car.

I heard screams. They weren’t mine...

I managed to get the big motorcycle under directional control and dropped the front wheel to the ground. I then used maximum braking and skidded to a stop in a cloud of tire smoke at the stop sign at a busy cross street.

I would have returned to fess up (and to get my glove back). I really would have. Really. But for two things. First, the cops did not seem interested or the slightest bit concerned about me at the moment. One of them was on his back in the front yard of the house they had been parked in front of and was rapidly crabbing backwards away from the patrol car. The other was standing in the street and was training a riot shotgun on the police cruiser.

So the cops were not interested in me. They often insist to “let the professionals handle it” anyway. That was one thing. The other? Well, I swear I could see the squirrel, standing in the back window of the patrol car among shredded and flying pieces of foam and upholstery, and shaking his little fist at me. I think he was shooting me the finger. That is one dangerous squirrel.

And now he has a patrol car.

I took a deep breath, turned on my turn-signal, made an easy right turn, and sedately left the neighborhood. As for my easy and slow drive home? Screw it. Faced with a choice of 80mph cars and inattentive drivers, or the evil, demonic, attack squirrel of death...I’ll take my chances with the freeway. Every time. And I’ll buy myself a new pair of gloves.

I think it is squirrel foreplay!

I was laying in my hammock a week or two ago, and since I have a lot of bird seed and birds, I also have a lot of squirrels. And I saw two gray squirrels on our far fence of our quarter acre. There was a thin, flexible branch that overhung the top of the fence by perhaps five feet. From that thin branch hung a squirrel, holding on by two of those prehensile rear squirrel feet, and one front one.

The free front squirrel hand was open to the side, and this was a somewhat odd pose, hanging upside down as it was. Then I realized the squirrel below it on the top of the fence was acting odd as well. It was jerking back and forth, running six inches this way at full speed, then turning, and running that way, repeating this, all with its eyes fixed on the dangling squirrel above.

Funny. It didn't hit me as the normal aggressive squirrel competitive and focused interaction when food or territory was at stake. And it didn't look like the horseplay of young squirrels.

Then it hit me, and it all made sense. This is what was going on:

FEMALE SQUIRREL: (hanging upside down from branch which was swishing side to side and bobbing up and down) La La La La La! Here I am! Luscious and beautiful in a squirrel way, and just out of your reach! La La La La La La! Ha ha ha ha ha! And you just can't reach me! La La La La La!

MALE SQUIRREL: (Dashing back and forth, looking up in frustration with her just dangling out of reach, the bobbing branch bringing her closer, then pulling her away just tantalizingly out of reach!) Argh! Agh! Arrrrrrr! ArrrrrrrgggHHHHHHHH! (with a frantic leap of desire and desperation, he coils and leaps with all of his squirrel might and is able to just grab a tip of the dangling branch!) AH HA! AH HAHAHAHAHA!

FEMALE SQUIRREL: (coyly) Ooopsie! Oh my! I am in such great danger! I must run to protect myself from the Gray Beast! (Turns and runs up the tree towards the disorderly clump of leaves near the top of the tree)

MALE SQUIRREL: (hot on her tail panting from the chase) You think you can tease me like that and get away with it, you don't know me! Prepare yourself!

FEMALE SQUIRREL: (her voice as she goes over the edge of the nest and disappears inside) Oh! Oh! You brute! All talk and no action!

Heh, all this took place in the span of perhaps five seconds, and as I watched this curious behavior and recognized it, I realized I had a big grin on my face! (for those disgusted by this act of Anthropomorphism on my part, I understand your outrage...this is just a source of humor to me, seeing it this way, not an actual scientific observation!)>/I>

At some point in my life, I had never been particularly interested in squirrels. I regarded them as un-interesting rodents, bur as I grew older and became interested in watching birds, I ended up watching plenty of squirrels.

I have always been interested in the food chain concept. Where things sit. If you are an earthworm, it is Robins that eat you. A chipmunk? Cats. A Blue Jay? Hawks. Humans? Well...other humans.

And so on. And I always presumed squirrels fit in there with dogs, or hawks or...whatever.

But in my life of watching squrrels, I have only found one skilled predator that consistently gets them, and it isn't hawks. As a matter of fact, I saw a squirrel placidly eating seed from my birdfeeder while it kept its eye on a hawk sitting nearby in a tree. And the hawk kept an idle eye on the squirrel. Each knew the other was there, but neither was interested in either running or swooping.

I had the distinct impression the bird seed was far more important to the squirrel than heeding the risk from a hawk, and the hawk seemed to have the mindset that squirrels, with their unusual squirrel intelligence, strong, prehensile feet, and sharp, aggressive teeth, were better left alone, and other food would soon be along.

And I have seen this same behavior with cats. They don't appear enthusiastic about attacking a full grown squirrel. Dogs are another thing. They go after them with relish, but...with not much success I have ever seen. I suspect dogs enjoy the chase as much as the catch, and that is enough for them.

So, when it comes to squirrels, I suspect hawks prefer them as carrion. I saw this as I came around the curve in a road, and it was unusual enough to make me get out of my car and approach it. (I am respectfully wary, but hawks with animals in their talons are more interested in protecting their meal by covering it with their wings to hide it, or they simply pick up their food and fly away, which this one did.)

I got the impression this was road-carrion, not a fresh hawk-kill>

As opposed to this video of a fresh kill I took, in which a hawk caught a rabbit outside my office, then when I got too close, it decided to take off, and like a B-29 overloaded with bombs and fuel, just managed to clear the ground as it fled, casually replenishing its grip on its prey when it appeared it might slip from its grasp!

I live near a road in a small city called something like "Waverly Oaks Road" and it is here I see the full expression of where in the food chain a squirrel might really exist if we were inclined to eat them more than we do. This road is often disgustingly carpeted with dead squirrels. It is a long, straight stretch of road lined with mature Oak trees, which means...acorns.

If it were humans involved, the desire to go from one side of the road to the other would be inhibited by the presence of mutilated and crushed human corpses plainly visible in the roadway. It plainly did not deter the squirrels from crossing the road, often jumping over the bodies of their fallen comrades as they did. And it was not in the least bit uncommon to see another squirrel added to the scores of carcasses by an oncoming car, the car in front of you, or your own car.

I have developed a theory about this. When God created the Earth, he had only six days to make everything that went into it. That is a lot of work. So, I suspected that he farmed out some of that work to Angels, who were capable, and tasked this one with creating the elephant, that one with creating the Aardvark, and so on. Squirrels came far down the list, and I have often wondered if he had a resource issue, and tasked an Angel named William with creating Squirrels.

The Angel William was a good angel, but...not talented in any way, and had no experience in wildlife creation workflows except for designing rats and cockroaches, but...when you need a body, you need a body. The Angel William might get it right this time. So God contracted Angel William to design and implement The Squirrel. And by and large, Angel William did a pretty good job of it.

Squirrels were fast. They had enough intelligence to improvise. They were athletic and durable. The reproduced prodigiously. But the six-day deadline was fast approaching, and when The Angel William wrote the algorithm to avoid cars, well, he was more interesting in getting the code installed to meet the deadline than he was in doing it right. Besides, he knew the schedule for the appearance of cars was long off in the future, so squirrels could learn what they needed to know in that time frame.

As we know, it didn't work out that way, and when squirrels began dying in great numbers on roadways, it came to the attention of God. He focused on this deficiency, and time and time again, he would see squirrels blindly rush out into oncoming traffic, only to have them appear at his feet a second or two later. This was not good. Then, as he watched, he saw another squirrel dash right between the wheels of a car and improbably appear safely on the other side, and as God's eyebrows rose in astonishment, the squirrel reversed course and ran right back under the wheels of the trailing car, and suddenly appeared at his feet, where it scurried away to the nearest heavenly tree.

God didn't explode in anger, as that was not his style, but he did ask calmly "Okay. Who designed The Squirrel?"

An Angel with a clipboard says "It was Angel William, my Lord."

I have often wondered if, when observing this earth in action, that God delivered unto himself a facepalm. If he ever did, it must have been then.

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