Last evening at the very same moment my wife was hounding me to slow down a fuzzy grey ball of terror darted in front of my car [almost as if to say ‘ha! I told you to slow down!’]. The front of the vehicle went over the little guy with no harm done, and the then the rear left tire completely smushed it. I peered for a fraction of a second in the rear view mirror only to see it bloodied and crushed in the road. One of those half crushed organy road pizzas. Terrible in every sense of the word.
The worse part about it, this was the second such murder in two months. And for this tree-hugg’in dirt worshipper I am crushed - excuse the adjective. I had a bad night after that, and of course my wife had that smug little half frown half smile on her pouty face.
I told you to slow down, was the only thing she said.
My sentence is to construct any of an array of squirrel feeder for our back yard.
Poor little guy. Further more I’ll never pump my bb-gun to ten pumps again to scare them off. I swear. Only cardboard targets from now on.
I killed a squirrel about ten years ago on my way to work. My foot slipped off the brake and tapped the gas just enough to catch him. I was a mess for the rest of the day. Thanks for dredging up a painful memory. sniff
Think of it as evolution in action. The aggregate intelligence of squirrels just went up a notch. So when the fuzzy little bastards take over, we know who to blame, don’t we?
I was driving at the speed limit, minding my own business, when I spotted a squirrelly little guy sitting up, in the road, just about where the passenger side tire was headed. I thought, of course he will move, he’s got plenty of warning. Sadly, no. I watched in fascination as he just stood there. Thubump, and just a sad gray tail waving in my rear view.
I feel for you Phlosphr. Earlier this year I was chasing squirrels away from the bird feeders with a BB gun. I hit and broke a panel of one of my feeders, and was pissed. I never thought I would hit/kill one. But then I got “lucky” and had a perfect head shot.
I took my family to see this lovely old covered bridge in our town. It’s no longer used for vehicle traffic, so after viewing the bridge, I had to turn around to go back the way we had come.
As I turned my vehicle around I heard a large snapping noise, like a large tree branch had broken. I got out to investigate. To my horror, I had run over a large turtle. :eek: It must have been about a foot long.
The turtle was an absolute mess, but not dead yet. While I knew it was hopeless, I couldn’t bring myself to put it out of it’s misery, but I couldn’t leave it in the road, either. I carefully carried it to the edge of the woods to die.
This happened over a year ago, and I am still very upset about it.
Living in a rural area, I think it’s a miracle that I haven’t run anything over yet, especially since I have to drive over twenty miles to get anywhere of interest. A squirrel would be sad enough, but at least they wouldn’t damage you or the car. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had one of these wild turkeys around here stand in the road exactly like a giant, mentally disabled pigeon. :smack:
The deer are worse, though. They like to jump out from between trees at night, so you never see them coming. Eesh.
I think that is a great idea, for the person that wants the squirrels gone. I bet they stay away afterwards. A new concept in mouse traps for sure, send them out the open window.
The grossest experience I have on crushing animals is when frogs cover the road and all of a sudden you hear thumping, bumping, and popping noises for fifty feet.
Colour me astonished that there is such a thing as a squirrel feeder. I thought they were joke captions for bird feeders (which function as the same thing around here).
There are zillions of squirrels in my neighbourhood and, while I wouldn’t classify them as “vermin” (more like an “organized crime syndicate,” I wouldn’t be surprised to find they were in cahoots with the raccoons to hijack food supply trucks), certainly they don’t need any help from the hand of wo/man to get themselves fed.
lieu I would love to construct one of those and if Mrs.P goes away for a weekend this winter I might just do that.
Every year in September we collect 2 full bushel baskets of acorns for the little beasts in the winter, this year I think I’ll try for a third…but that’s a lot of acorns. We;ve got the oak trees to gather that many, but heck…I usually end up doing it myself. This year I think I’ll have some help from the Mrs. in lieu of the murders and all. I hope it was quick.
Reminds me of a story a friend tells about running over a squirrel. He says he didn’t feel bad until he looked in the rear view mirror and saw another squirrel run out and check on the first.
