Last week I saw a tiny sharp face peering at me from the stairs. For a moment I thought it was a rat. then I saw the tail and realised it was one of the neighbourhood squirrels. It's one thing having these little things outside, but inside is different. I was hoping our intruder would walk down the stairs and out of the front door. But oh no, it headed for the kitchen. I ended up opening all the windows before persuading him to be on his way.
The next day Target went for a snack. He came back seconds later with huge eyes to tell me that someone was eating his food. When I went with him, I saw this:
Then this:
Target was terrified. And our intruder was terrified too! I put Target on the bed, opened up the bathroom window, looped back the luxaflex and thought that would be enough to show our unwanted guest the way out.
But oh, no! The squirrel was terrified. It took him 15 minutes to get the idea that an open window means an exit.
We see these little visitors all the time. They rush around like maniacs but our cats don't bother them much. If one whizzes past, Au and Target will chase it. But if it stops, the cats ignore it.
I thought my cats were just lazy (or finally listening to my speeches about the need for peaceful coexistance!) or that these little rats with tails smell bad. But the strays we feed don't bother them either. And those cats will skin a rat before you can say, "dinner time."
Our squirrels are so blase about the neighbourhood fuzzies that they steal the cat biscuits we put out at the back for the stray girls. We can hear their loud sucking noises the second we close the back door.
I was talking to
Sharon about our visitor when she put me straight. We dont' have squirrels, we've got Tree Shrews, called
Tupai in Malay. When she told me these animals are well known to be exceptionally intelligent, all I could say was that our visitor was pretty thick.
But then Sharon pointed out that
tupai are wellknown drunks. They're such notorious piss artists that they have their own
YouTube shows. That of course is different. I rushed home immediately and checked the booze cupboard. The vodka was untouched.
Luckily the drunken tupai are the pen tailed tupai. Clearly we have the Common Malaysian Tupai visiting us. As you can see, he's got a bushy tail, not a quil-like one.
Pen tailed tupai:
Common Malaysian tupai:
He's welcome to pop in for cat biscuits. But if he pinches my vodka, there's going to be trouble!
Happy Cats On Tuesday! For more cats, visit
Gattina or check the blog roll on the left.
