Two days away from my usual spot and it was a squirrel war on my previously-rodent-free birdfeeder. And they are emphatically copycats: if one does it, each one in the vicinity has to try, just like little kids: Well, but HE got to, so why can’t *I*?
Yo? Did you see your littermate hit the ground running from up there when I opened the door? It couldn’t have been fun.
So today one was keeping an eye on me, judging to see if I might walk away out of sight so it could have a go at that awning pole and then go leaping across to the food from there. Like I didn’t know exactly what it was thinking–I’ve seen them do a “Mother May I” game, running a few feet forward if I turn my head away, freezing if I turn back to see.  They charm me so, the little toddlers.
What he didn’t realize was the neighbor’s cat was watching him intently from halfway across the grass. Not stalking him; more like it was watching the wing-and-foot show and noting where future snackage was to be found should the need arise.
I opened the door and squirrel, birds, and cat fled to safety.
Those black squirrels’ preoccupation with me and that feeder was Darwinizing them. I took some aluminum foil. I taped a short length of it to the pole opposite the feeder–nothing harmful in any way, but nothing for agile little feet to pitch their in-tent from either.
Went off to church. Came home to find crinkled foil, still holding–someone must have tried from below–and a little black squirrel sitting among my amaryllises on the picnic table, staring longingly up, wondering if maybe, just maybe, he could make the leap from over that-a-way. All that lovely, lovely millet and sunflower seeds.
Not a chance. (So far.)