It's a Jungle Out There!

We have somewhat of an animal problem in our backyard. The kids all think it's great because we don't have any pets. They have gone and named all of the animals. We however (Steve and I) aren't because well, you'll see. The first varmit, is a squirrel. The kids have named it Mr./Mrs. Nutterworth (aren't sure whether it's a boy or a girl). It is living in our rocks in the backyard. If you look at about the middle of the picture, amongst all the watermelon plants, you can see it sticking it's head out of the hole. The pain about the squirrel is it has burrowed a little nest behind the rocks. It has gone in and pushed all of the dirt out from behind all of the rocks and made him/herself right at home. Our concern is what happens now. Will it stay through the winter? Is it building up a food supply behind those rocks to last? Who knows. I did catch Jenna and Jayden outside with a bag of trail mix trying to leave the squirrel some nuts. Had to put an end to that one!

Here the squirrel is running back to it's home:

Our second set of "guests" in the backyard, are a family, of quail. There are twelve of them in all. And every morning they come through our backyard, and play a bit, before hopping over the back fence and leaving. It is a morning ritual though. The funny thing is we have seen the squirrel watching them in the backyard. Here they are making their exit:

Also over the summer, we had two Doves make a nest in one of our trees and then a family of Robins make a nest in another tree. Like I said the kids were really excited about the whole thing, but if it is a continual problem. I don't think Steve and I will be.