This is not a metaphor or hyperbole or anything like that. No. I know there are more critters than you can shake a stick at in my yard, because I’ve tried it. Shaking sticks, fists, and random gardening tools in the front yard causes the deer, squirrels, woodchucks, chipmunks, and rabbits to run to the back, which causes the critters already in back to run around to the front.

wikipedia chipmunk; mine’s too fast for photos

The new pair of juvenile eagles haven’t discovered the joys of sitting around for hours on my fence and deck posts the way last year’s did. This has emboldened the earthbound deer, rabbits, and woodchucks to tramp on my flowerbeds, and the aeronautical squirrels and chipmunks to invade my barricaded tomatoes.

The chipmunks, if they’re having a world-weary day and not in the mood for climbing and jumping, run right up to the chickenwire, say some magic chipmunk word, and materialize on the other side. You may think they squeeze through, but I never see them do it. I see them run up to the fence and then suddenly there they are inside it, on their way to rip the critterproof netting over the tomatoes. My best defense turns out to be a nose-irritating spray

hole in the chew-proof netting

that keeps them from staying in the garden long enough to bite through the netting. It’s very satisfying to see them run in, turn around, and run out again, foodlessly.

And yet, they are cute, and they’re just trying to live. They have a libertarian attitude to private property: every critter for himself. Herself. Itself. They fight each other tooth and nail for seeds, nuts, possession of my deck. Chipmunks know nothing of government being instituted to secure everyone’s rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Unlike us.

 
But what does the cat say? Read it here.