The battle in the garden over the bird feeder is significant in that too many factions were fighting over the same resource. The small birds don’t eat all the food – they drop a lot of it and so other wildlife comes along to take advantage of the harvest. Fat pigeons – some almost as large as chickens – inhabit a tree in a neighbouring garden and they visit regularly. This delights the local cats and foxes who occasionally prosper from their lacklustre short flights. The squirrels auditioned for their own personal supply by making a nuisance of themselves with acrobatic displays, launching from the bike shed and hedge. Beneath them all, the rats decided to mark their own territory.
In the big empty clay pot beneath the feeder the old grizzled rat with part of his tail missing spent a good part of his day, vacuuming up what was dropped by the birds. I speculated that an alliance of sorts existed as a robin seemed to be deliberately dropping seed downwards on numerous occasions. The magpie too, trying to hover displaced a lot. The squirrel, deciding another assault up the greasy pole was a better use of energy than the frantic leaps decided to step onto the pot for easier access and that’s when the fight started. The big old rat leapt upwards and the squirrel, performing a back flip to escape landed, paused and took stock. The rat has skinny little legs, whist the squirrel is the bodybuilder of the garden with great musculature. I imagine he thought this out too as he went back for a second dose much like the drunken fool on a Friday night who has just been ejected from the night club by the retired ex boxer. In similar circumstances the squirrel was again repelled and departed looking somewhat offended. It’s not just muscle and conditioning that makes a fighter, courage and controlled aggression play a part. Quick reactions and big dirty teeth likely were factors in this instance.
It was decided that a separate squirrel feeder be installed and this was initially put on the bike shed launch point with the idea that the squirrel would find it much easier to access his own food rather than risk the flight across to it. The rat liked this option too and it was amusing to watch the rat climb inside with squirrel outside – now the tables were turned and every time the rat stuck his head out he was attacked.
The way my mind ponders over such things in a span of a few days between other more pressing concerns amused me. There are no hurt feelings report forms to be filled out and no ethics committee to read them. Survival of the fittest and all that. I kind of built the rat up to be the king of the garden giving him a Bob Menery style dialogue. “Hey muscle head, get out of my pot.”
That narrative ended one morning when I saw the fox carrying the big rat away. “My gang will get you,” might have been the rat’s last words whilst the squirrel sitting atop the feeder eating a nut with a “yeah, whatever.”
See you down the road.
