# Update thread for Red Squirrel kittens



## feorag (Jul 31, 2007)

Thought I'd do an update thread to stop the other one getting too long.

The squirrels grow more and more manic every day and it gets harder and harder to get photos of them unless they stop to eat and the speed they move now is awesome!!

This morning Countryfile have been here for a couple of hours videoing them for their programme. Even the producer and her runner who came here to recce everything 2 weeks ago couldn't believe how much they'd changed and how much faster they were. The cameraman spent most of the time with at least one of the sitting on his head and they spent loads of time running along the boom rod onto the microphone!!!

Anyway a couple of more recent photographs

All four of them on top of the climbing frame (my sun loungers! :roll 10 days ago - you'll see a difference when you look at the recent photos, even in 10 days!










Tucking into hazelnuts on my husband's shoulder.










Sitting in the hawthorn berries eating a pine cone










And this is what happens when you bring home corn on the cob and put the shopping bag down on the kitchen bench.










This morning with Adam Henson from Countryfile!











Video taken on the 1st October, once we'd learned how to lap 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2k-npQ3qVTA


And another taken on Saturday morning.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7MmwlUj9Qzc&feature=related


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## blade100 (Sep 26, 2009)

oh my goodness :gasp::flrt:<3
they are gorgeous,i wouldn't be able to let them go if it was me.
they look very settled there!:lol2:


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## Pouchie (Feb 9, 2008)

They are stunning! I try to catch Countryfile so look forward to seeing them on tv :2thumb:


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## feorag (Jul 31, 2007)

blade100 said:


> oh my goodness :gasp::flrt:<3
> they are gorgeous,i wouldn't be able to let them go if it was me.
> they look very settled there!:lol2:


They are very settled here and are loving their playroom - my utility room!! I said to the cameraman when I looked at it through the lens of the camera that it looked a right mess :roll: but they said it looked like a utility room! The coats are the waterproofs we walk the dog in, but we leave them hanging up so the squirrels can climb up them and the 2 dog towels which hang from hooks in the ceiling, so they can get from one side of the room to the other - they jump from towel to coat to towel etc, so it teaches them dexterity, judgment and muscles them up!!!

The temptation to just keep them is very great indeed, but it has to be what's best for them and we've now found the right place and a pen is being built in the next week or two ready for them to go! :sad:



Pouchie said:


> They are stunning! I try to catch Countryfile so look forward to seeing them on tv :2thumb:


It's going out on the 30th October apparently. Adam was up to do the interview because tomorrow they're featuring a hill farm in Elsdon (which is absolutely in the middle of nowhere) and of course he's the farmer of the 3 presenters.


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## Shell195 (May 31, 2007)

Awesome videos, you even had Steve going all girlie while he watched them:lol2:


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## feorag (Jul 31, 2007)

:lol2: You should hear Barry when he's in the utility room - he talks away to them like they were babies - I stand in the kitchen and PMSL!!!

Got some more videos - just haven't had time to upload them yet!


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## Amalthea (Oct 2, 2007)

They are looking too beautiful, Eileen!!


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## feorag (Jul 31, 2007)

By the way been thinking about growing a moustache to match my hair - what d'ya think?? :lol2:


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## Zoo-Man (Apr 12, 2008)

:gasp: Eileen, stop giving V's to the cameraman!!! 

:lol2:

Yu are extremely lucky Eileen, not only getting to spend time (albeit much hard work) with such amazing native animals, but also to find a bit of fame & get your face on to the box. Who knows, maybe we'll be seeing you drinking in the Rovers Return next! :lol2:

ETA: I still havent't heard back from Debra Stephenson yet


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## MissCat (Mar 9, 2009)

Is it actually possible to die of the "cute"? If so, I think i'm terminal. 

SO SWEET!!!!!!!!


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## FreddiesMum (Jan 10, 2007)

:flrt: cuteness overload they look fantastic. feorag :notworthy:how lucky those wee cuties are that you rescued them.


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## em_40 (Sep 29, 2010)

soooo cute :flrt:

and what a great job you have done with them, they certainly seem confident.


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## EVIEMAY (Mar 6, 2008)

They are a delight Eileen you are doing a great job with them.

Great pictures


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## Smigsy (Jul 30, 2009)

Two things here

First how did you get them to stay in one place long enough for this pic? And two have you ever seen four critters more primed to explode into mischief?

image


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## feorag (Jul 31, 2007)

I'm certain I'd never get them like that again! It was just the novelty of being in that room for the first or second time.


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## feorag (Jul 31, 2007)

Today I received a big parcel from Lois (Kemist on here) in Staffs. She sent me some damsons and hawthorn berries. I didn't have time to open it earlier, so I opened it this afternoon and gave them a damson, which, as you can see, was very successful. All 4 had a munch on it which is why it's now spread all over the floor and the bowl is empty.

So thank you very much indeed Lois for that useful contribution which I now know they will enjoy!!


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## kemist (Jan 25, 2009)

not a problem they were only sitting in my freezer from when we ran out of things to make with them and friends to share them with( the tree had about 14 kilos on it. 
I have to ask tho were you secretly hoping they didn't like them so that you could do gin with them?


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## Mirf (May 22, 2008)

They are simply too wonderful:flrt:. I am hugely envious of you being able to spend time with such amazing little animals.


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## feorag (Jul 31, 2007)

kemist said:


> not a problem they were only sitting in my freezer from when we ran out of things to make with them and friends to share them with( the tree had about 14 kilos on it.
> I have to ask tho were you secretly hoping they didn't like them so that you could do gin with them?


He He!!!

Well there are so many of them that I'm sure they will go off before the squigs can eat them all, so some might have to go in some gin or certainly they'll go into a damson crumble! :mf_dribble:


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## kemist (Jan 25, 2009)

feorag said:


> He He!!!
> 
> Well there are so many of them that I'm sure they will go off before the squigs can eat them all, so some might have to go in some gin or certainly they'll go into a damson crumble! :mf_dribble:


I could be a spoil sport and say you have a freezer but instead i will say the gin in my cellar smells divine and i heartily recomend them for gin. 

I also need a berry question answered my OH's dad has what looks like holly in his garden but the berries are blueberry colour(inside and out) any idea what they are and if i can use them for booze


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## feorag (Jul 31, 2007)

I've no idea what they are. I've seen bushes with blue berries, but I've no idea what they and whether they are safe to eat! I'm not that good a gardener sadly! :sad:

As far as the damsons are concerned, have you ever re-frozen them? I googled it to try and find out and all I could find out was that they would end up very soft and slushy and would go darker in colour, so I wasn't sure if it would work. I'm quite happy to refreeze them in smaller batches to suit the squirrels if they do refreeze OK.


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## kemist (Jan 25, 2009)

feorag said:


> I've no idea what they are. I've seen bushes with blue berries, but I've no idea what they and whether they are safe to eat! I'm not that good a gardener sadly! :sad:
> 
> As far as the damsons are concerned, have you ever re-frozen them? I googled it to try and find out and all I could find out was that they would end up very soft and slushy and would go darker in colour, so I wasn't sure if it would work. I'm quite happy to refreeze them in smaller batches to suit the squirrels if they do refreeze OK.


Not sure if they refreeze my logic says freezing once would have done whatever damage was going to happen. Brewing recipes say freezing actually helps release juice as it breaks down the fibre of the fruit. since there was a few tho i do think it would be a crime for the people not to share them. After all what sort of foster mother would you be if you were not willing to eat/drink what you would give them.
Maybe try it with a small batch and re defrost them and see how usable they are. Apart from that good luck and enjoy them however they end up.


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## feorag (Jul 31, 2007)

Yes I found that out on the internet - freezing also makes them much easier to stone and the stone did just slide out when I squeezed one. 

I think I'll try refreezing small batches of the largest box and see how they fair and I might make a crumble for my husband and granddaughter when she arrives for her school holidays tomorrow.


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## Mirf (May 22, 2008)

kemist said:


> I also need a berry question answered my OH's dad has what looks like holly in his garden but the berries are blueberry colour(inside and out) any idea what they are and if i can use them for booze


They are simply a different form of holly I'm afraid and the berries are just as toxic as the 'normal' red berry.



feorag said:


> I think I'll try refreezing small batches of the largest box and see how they fair and I might make a crumble for my husband and granddaughter when she arrives for her school holidays tomorrow.


Re-freezing them tends to break down the tissue even more and they have a nasty habit of turning to sludge. I would be tempted to use as many as you can to be honest.


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## feorag (Jul 31, 2007)

Mirf said:


> Re-freezing them tends to break down the tissue even more and they have a nasty habit of turning to sludge. I would be tempted to use as many as you can to be honest.


That's what I'd read and I thought it wouldn't work for the squirrels as they don't seem to like sloppy fruit - I tried them on puree when they were first weaning and they didn't like it.


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## Shellsfeathers&fur (Jan 18, 2009)

kemist said:


> I could be a spoil sport and say you have a freezer but instead i will say the gin in my cellar smells divine and i heartily recomend them for gin.
> 
> I also need a berry question answered my OH's dad has what looks like holly in his garden but the berries are blueberry colour(inside and out) any idea what they are and if i can use them for booze


I wonder if it is a Mahonia Aquifolium also known as the Grape Holly or Oregon Grape. Does it have yellow flowers? If it is a Mahnonia then the berries can be used for wine and jam.

Can you post a picture at all?


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## feorag (Jul 31, 2007)

3 more videos taken on the 11th October.

Red squirrels getting more naughty every day - Part 1 - YouTube

Red squirrels getting more naughty every day - Part 2 - YouTube

Red squirrels getting more naughty every day - Part 3 - YouTube


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## Shell195 (May 31, 2007)

feorag said:


> 3 more videos taken on the 11th October.
> 
> Red squirrels getting more naughty every day - Part 1 - YouTube
> 
> ...


Fab videos as usual. The famous 4(or should that be 5:whistling2 are looking great:no1: How long before they go into the aviary for the winter?


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## feorag (Jul 31, 2007)

:lol2: The owners of the garden where we are putting them are about to start building it, so it's just a matter of when it's built they can go.


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## feorag (Jul 31, 2007)

14th october - kittens having fun in my spare bedroom, while I'm trying to do something on the computer.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EU1WQ8zR5D4


And 15th October - fun with the kitchen roll and my granddaughter's excitement at meeting the squirrels quickly wained after a scratched face - she now prefers the rats! :lol2:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h8nbS1EHugs


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## feorag (Jul 31, 2007)

*Kittens move out to their release pen today*



Well the red squirrel kittens finally left us today, so this will be the last photographs and video of them for a few weeks.

The pen in all its glory with my husband inside on a stepladder merrily drilling and screwing stuff to the beams and walls.











This is a very small part of what will meet them when they finally leave the pen - the fence in the bottom left hand corner is the small fence which surrounds the orchard where the pen is situated











And the squirrels themselves having great fun exploring































































And although they all came steaming out of the carrier and ran around having great fun, I think it was a little too much for one of the girls and she decided to get inside my fleece and hide down the sleeve. Eventually she came out, but only stuck her head out the front – very unusual with these kittens as they don’t like to be held or stroked like the previous 2, but she seemed quite happy to just sit inside my fleece and watch the other 3 run around.




















And finally, this is what happened when I opened the cat carrier and set them free!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4S4e0ps6yL8

And their parting gift to me??? 4 scratches on my face, one of them right on the end of my nose and a torn lip! 
They will insist on jumping on my face from a great height!


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## Shell195 (May 31, 2007)

feorag said:


> Well the red squirrel kittens finally left us today, so this will be the last photographs and video of them for a few weeks.
> 
> The pen in all its glory with my husband inside on a stepladder merrily drilling and screwing stuff to the beams and walls.
> 
> ...


 
Totally amazing and a lovely ending to the first chapter of their lives, I bet you are going to miss them though. I look forward to updates at release time next year:no1:


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## Zoo-Man (Apr 12, 2008)

Wow Eileen, they have certainly been catered well for! :2thumb:


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## feorag (Jul 31, 2007)

It's a pretty good pen isn't it and Barry has been there for almost 8 hours a day on Friday, Saturday, yesterday and then another 3 hours this morning, putting all those things in.

The problem was that he couldn't get electricity to the pen, so had to take his battery drill/screwdriver, which meant every time he drilled a hole into the wood high up, he had to get down the ladder, change the drill to the screwdriving and climb back up again, so it was a slow and tortuous thing. The pen had quite a few gaps between the frame that he felt they could squeeze out, or chew a bit and get out, so he had to make loads of 'covers' and screw them over the top of the gaps. And of course he had to go into the wood to find the wooden branches and then screw them all in place inside.

However, all that hard work was well worth it I think!


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## Shellsfeathers&fur (Jan 18, 2009)

You've (both) done a brilliant job :no1: - their new home was lovely.

You must be so pleased and proud of them! Thank you for filming them and doing threads on here etc.


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## feorag (Jul 31, 2007)

I've just spoken to the owners of the garden tonight, just to make sure everything is OK and they've said everything is fine so far.

The kittens have already been visited by an adult red squirrel who was sitting on top of their pen today :2thumb:

He also mentioned the little boy was 'enjoying' the company of the girls! :gasp: I've watched him 'practicing' here, so I guess that's what he doing! :lol2:


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## feorag (Jul 31, 2007)

Not the best start to our day when the phone rang at 8:15am and we had to dash out on a mission of mercy this morning!

When we explained how to build the pen we asked Graham (the garden owner who is also a farmer) to put paving slabs down, but for some reason he didn't want to do that and was talking about laying wire underneath the grass. Then Barry took him to see the pen he'd built (with the pavings slabs laid down) and showed him what we were describing to him, including the full width area blocked off from the squirrels with the feeding hatch so that you could enter the area, close the door and feed and if a squirrel escaped through the hatch it would still be trapped in the 'tardis' area.

Anyway when Barry went up there was no slabs down and there were gaps between the wooden 'walls' and the grass because of the ground being uneven. Graham said he had railway sleepers at the farm and he was going to bury them into the ground surface along the base of the pen. When Barry went back on the Saturday there was no sign of him or the sleepers, but when he went back on Sunday the sleepers were there ready cut so Barry spent all day digging them down to ground level and buttressing them against the 'walls'. However, there wasn't a piece there for him to lay along the back of the pen, so he was just hoping that the fence the pen was built against would stop them escaping because the wire was a good few inches into the ground.


Sadly it wasn't. It would appear that a squirrel was burying nuts (he found 3 hazelnuts in the hole) and had found its way to freedom on Friday morning. To say I was gutted would be an understatement, because if they'd only just laid paving slabs like we suggested it wouldn’t have happened and after 7 weeks of careful nurturing, they managed to get one to escape in 5 bl**dy days!! 

So when the phone rang at 8:15am it was Grahame to say that they’d borrowed a trap and had managed to catch the squirrel overnight but it was at death’s door, so what could they do! He thought it was dehydrated so was drip feeding water with Stress powder in it. So I explained how to test for dehydration and he came back and said it wasn’t, so I told him it would be hypothermia (had to happen on the coldest night we’ve just about had so far this year) and to put it in a covered dark box with some towelling and put it somewhere warm and we would come straight up.

During the conversation he also mentioned that another one had escaped and jumped on Caroline’s head while they were getting the other one out of the trap :gasp:

Fortunately by the time we got there (they’re an hour’s drive away) the squirrel was in a box sitting on a folded blanket on top of the Aga and had come around and was moving about and grunting away. I had a good look at her and she seem subdued, but fit and well, so we moved her away from the direct heat (before she did dehydrate :lol: ) and had a cup of coffee, after which we took her back to the pen. During the conversation they said that the other one had escaped yesterday, but they'd re-set the trap after taking the other one out and had caught it straight away, so it was back in the pen! So Graham has now put a paving slabs in the escape corner and all exits hopefully are now covered

The hypothermic one mooched about quite happily on the floor of the pen and then jumped up. Unfortunately her judgement was slightly impaired and she misjudged a couple of jumps, but she was active enough and ended up jumping into the squirrel feeder, where she sat for the rest of the time we were observing them, just eating. :2thumb:

I thought I’d ended my responsibility for them when I handed them over, but I see now that I haven’t, so it wasn’t the best start to my morning, but at least all 4 are now back in the pen and this time we hope the base has been corrected and there are no more escape areas for them to dig out of.


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## Esarosa (Jul 13, 2007)

^ this sprung to mind when I read this Eileen.

Hopefully the changes made will prevent any other escapees.


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## feorag (Jul 31, 2007)

:lol2: My God that is so true!!! :lol2:


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## Postcard (Aug 29, 2010)

Really glad you managed to save the wee one (again :lol2 - the pen looks absolutely smashing and they're looking the picture of health :flrt:


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## EVIEMAY (Mar 6, 2008)

What a worry for you Eileen - you must still feel reponsible for them even though your part should be done.

There will be nobody that match the care they have had from you though.

I am so glad you found the little one and just hope they continue to prosper.


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## feorag (Jul 31, 2007)

Thanks to both of you. I think the weekend's occurrence have actually frightened the people a lot. I know that if I handed over 4 tiny weak, almost dead baby squirrels to someone and they nursed them back to health and nurtured them for 7 weeks and when they came back to me the picture of health, for release and I basically lost 2 within 6 days and almost ended up with one dying I'd have been pretty embarrassed to admit it!


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## selina20 (May 28, 2008)

Harry Hill did a thing on your squirrels on his TV burp :lol2:


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## vonnie (Aug 20, 2007)

Only just caught up to date on this. What a worry Eileen!

Thank goodness it wasn't last night or the poor girl wouldn't have made it I don't think. Really heavy frost this morning.

Hopefully that was a one off and you'll be able to relax a little now!


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## freekygeeky (May 25, 2007)

selina20 said:


> Harry Hill did a thing on your squirrels on his TV burp :lol2:


i saw this too, they were taking the pee out of it!


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## selina20 (May 28, 2008)

freekygeeky said:


> i saw this too, they were taking the pee out of it!


Dont he always take the pee out of everything lol. He actually irritates me so much


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## feorag (Jul 31, 2007)

selina20 said:


> Harry Hill did a thing on your squirrels on his TV burp :lol2:


I was happily watching "Come Dancing" and got a text from a friend to say my house and squirrels had just been on Harry Hill.

Well knowing how he takes the pee out of everyone I was really panicking. I expected some kind of comment about not being able to afford wardrobe doors, because we have mirror doors in our bedroom and so the cameraman insisted that they had to be open (revealing my husband's less than tidy side! :bash otherwise he would have reflected in the mirror.

Either that or a comment about all the stuff hanging up in the utility room, because the camera crew didn't want to take anything down, because it was reflecting how we were using them to help the squirrels' agility.

As it happens I watched it and fortunately he wasn't taking the pee out of us, as much as the programme for the way they presented the red squirrel bit at the beginning - like the comment about the forest being ideal red squirrel territory, but we weren't going to see any! Then that they lost their home and ended up with a 3 bedroom semi in Cramlington!

Yvonne - I certainly hope it was a one off - I can't be doing with that every weekend! :gasp:

Sighs of relief all around in the Welsh household! :lol2:


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