Sue's Blog - Some assembly required.

Chippy business.

I am getting a bit worried about one of our chippies.
The chipmunks go into hibernation in October and usually sleep right round until about April.
A few weeks ago, during Alanmas, we had a couple of milder days and this little guy came out to get some seed from beneath the birdie feeder.
I was amazed.
Alan was gobsmacked as he had never, ever seen a chipmunk here before.
They are running about all over the place during the spring, summer and autumn, but they are always tucked up and snoring ( I like to think they snore) their little heads off when he is here.
He has been coming over for 17 years and never seen one of the chippies.
I sort of understood it though.
Those couple of days were quite mild, for us, and maybe he wanted to replenish his supplies.
He shouldn't have been short of supplies as they emptied the bird feeder every five minutes during September/October.
Anyway....the above photo was taken yesterday.
The temperature was around minus 15 Celsius and it was blowing a gale.
Nothing meek or mild about that then.
There he was in the seed filling his chops again.

A bit later I noticed a lady stop and stare into our garden.
I was a bit perturbed because that usually means their dog is pooping in our garden or, as happened once last year, there was an injured bird which resulted in us making a trip with it to the humane society.
I looked out to see what she was staring at.
It was this....
It was the chippy sitting by his hole.
Can you see it?
He has dug a hole up through the snow from his tunnel.
His tail is still sticking down it.

He sat there for ages.
I do hope he isn't ill.
It is just very odd behaviour for a chipmunk.
We had more snow overnight so his hole must have filled in.
If he digs his hole out again today I might have to start calling him Merv.

posted by Sue Banks @ 1:56 PM