That is so funny! My Mom is a ‘train enthusiast’ and her back yard used to look like Disneyland with all of her tracks and fancy landscaping, tunnels, etc.
The squirrels were her Mortal Enemy. They were constantly stealing her small figurines from her little towns built along the tracks. She would trap them in Have-A-Heart traps, then spray paint their tails bright blue, and take them about 5 miles away and release them. (Everyone needs a hobby, I guess!)
She never had a blue-tailed squirrel make a return trip to her yard, LOL!
My mother was like your mother. She was unhappy with all the squirrles.
One day I was visiting her, walked by the bathroom and happened to push the door open. There she was - one foot on the toilet seat, a long gun out the window and shooting her 22. I said, “what are you doing?” She replied with a look of distain, “What the heck does it look like I’m doing? These damn squirrels.”
I replied, “OMG do you ever hit them?”
Freepers, turn away if you are sensitive and don’t want to be triggered.
Her reply: “33 in the past year”
My reply: All of them?
Her reply: No, not all of them. There is one I don’t shoot at. He has the very short tail”