Baby Squirrels

Our black cat (Johnny Cash) killed the mother of the two baby squirrels my cousin Ben found under the tiller in our garage. We brought them inside last night and gave them a bit of goat's milk after which they perked up. I've since learned that goat's milk is not recommended, but they did seem to like it.

This morning both baby squirrels were bouncing off the walls of the recycling container I put them in, so I covered it with a cooling rack to keep them from jumping out. Ben is lobbying Carter to support his efforts to convince me that we should keep them as pets.

Carter has named them Mark and Joe. Mark jumps and runs around and likes to sit on Joe's head. Joe seems healthy, but content to be sat on. They are pretty cute, but after 10 minutes of surfing on the internet to see what it would take to raise squirrels, and the giant cage they'd need, I won't bow to the pressure. We'll probably keep them another day for "study", then release them to Johnny, I mean in the woods.

According to the internet, early spring is the most difficult time for squirrels as the nuts they hid are now sprouting, so their diet is more limited so they travel greater distances for food. This happily explains for me why there are so many dead ones in the road. Last week on a walk around the block, I counted four dead squirrels. Also, our baby squirrels seem to be eating solid foods already, so they are likely weaned, which would be another reason the mother was carelessly galavanting in Johnny's territory.