Heidi Chronicles: Enjoying the Antics of the Kids!

Maybe that "imprinting" thing explains why I had to carry around 2 baby birds all last week. First a finch (tiniest thing ever!) caught my eye & I lifted it onto the crotch of a tree. Danged if I didn't turn around an hour later & here is the little finch flapping & cheeping its way across the lawn to me. So I carried it around for awhile & put it in a hanging basket that night (its parents definitely knew where it was, big racket all around).

The next day, b'friend & I are sitting by the river & he says LOOK AT THAT, and here comes baby finch making a beeline for me. I gave up & let it sit on my ponytail for the day, then back in the hanging basket & by morning thankfully it had finally learned to fly, apparently.

The next day a baby robin did the same thing! Parents squawking, I kept trying to put it up somewhere high but NO it wanted to ride on my ponytail so badly that it actually scurried right past 3 cats & a dog who were lounging in the garden!

Birds are weird.

LOL, summerkid! Next time, get b'friend to take pics!!!

No thank you, KY, there will be NO pix of me carrying birds on my head.

ROFL

what if i forgot the bird was perched there & decided to go through a drive-up window?!

Summerkid, that is just too cool!!! I think I'll put my hair in a ponytail tomorrow and see what happens . . . I would love to have a little finch with me (not sure about a robin, though - tad bit bigger!!!).

Do you all find it as amazing as I do to see the correlation between mothers and babies of all species? We all know there's plenty of really poor human mothers. But I am surprised to hear about poor raccoon (or other species) moms. Guess that was naive of me to think that we are the only creatures that screw up!!!

Oh, keep these stories coming - I'm loving them! And, Cheryl, I find it so exciting to hear about Rupert learning his name - and so quickly! Glad you enjoyed Thistle.

Summerkid, that's too funny; and it does sound like the baby birds were imprinting, though that's very unusual for fledglings who've been raised by their real parents. Something about your ponytail must be super appealing: congratulations!

summerkid -- I would consider that quite a compliment - having the baby birds so attracted to you that way. What a wonderful and unique experience.

I've had an ongoing experience with a certain Tufted Titmouse who 1st tried to destroy my house and then started landing on my head every time I sat down in the garden to pull weeds. He would walk around on my head, choose his favorite hairs and work at trying to pluck them. Sometimes he'd "walk" around on the side of my head. Seeing the bird diving for my head evoked some primal fears but the instant he landed and started walking around up there I could not keep from laughing out loud. It felt so funny - his little feet hopping around up there - kind of tickled.

But, clearly, "my" bird had an agenda. I think it's sweat that the birds apparently just wanted to be with you.

Now getting back to the saga of our friendly raccoons, where were we? Oh, yes, Diva...

Diva is becoming a problem. Thursday night was just a sample. Diva arrived early and took possession of the entire feeding area, menacing and threatening anyone who tried to come near the area. When Heidi came down and tried to approach a dish that Diva wasn't even using, Diva lunged at her. Heidi backed away and started back toward the fence and the tree where she'd left the kids.

At that point I intervened. I wasn't sure if I could pull it off. In fact, I figured I could not, but still I had to try. I called out to Heidi, and she stopped to look back at me. She was hungry. She wanted to eat. My only hope was that she would recognize that I was calling her to eat and would not harm her...I continued to call Heidi even though I could no longer see her as my eyes were focused on Diva as I stood up and walked toward Diva motioning with my arm while saying "Go!"

For an instant, Diva looked up at me as if to say, "Who, me?" But then as I continued toward her, Diva turned and ran back toward the fence. During all of this, I continued calling out to Heidi - still not looking at her but hoping she was there. Heidi had been standing just beyond and to one side of Diva so that by advancing on Diva in this manner, I risked chasing Heidi away as well. Incredibly, though, Heidi "got" it for even as I stepped forward pushing Diva out, Heidi moved around behind us to grab the dish of food. Once again, even without a common language Heidi and I had collaborated to transfer ownership of the food from Diva to Heidi.

Of course, Diva didn't really go very far. As soon as I sat back down again, she returned to the pool, but Heidi continued to eat from the newly acquired dish, and Diva didn't mess with her anymore. I knew Diva wouldn't bother Heidi once Heidi had established "ownership" of the dish. They have clearly established rules where that sort of thing is concerned.

The peace was short lived, however. Soon Heidi's kids came down the fence and, being kids, one made the mistake of wandering too close to Diva. Earlier, I had been tossing peanuts in the pool to keep Diva away from Rupert's food - everything lately is about controlling Diva. Some had landed on the ground beside the pool, and now, much to my horror, Diva and one of Heidi's kits were both eating the peanuts - only about 1ft apart. As I watched, I was surprised that Diva tolerated the kid so close to her for so long. (I often think that Heidi holds private off-line chats with the others back in the forest when I'm not around.) But as the kid kept wandering aimlessly closer to Diva, the inevitable happened, well, almost...

Just as Diva turned to launch her attack on the kid, I called out, "Diva! NO!" Amazingly, the timing was perfect, and that worked. It got her attention, "broke" the mood, altered the moment. Diva paused for a moment, and the kid - or actually all of the kids - ran back to the fence. I had kept Diva from pouncing on the poor kid but had also scared the kids away - or had Heidi signaled for them to leave? Either way, I would not see them again that night.

A short while later Fraidy made the mistake of walking through the area, and Diva attacked her viciously. Fraidy was down on her side and Diva was still attacking and biting. Quickly, I stood up and threw the only thing I had available - a handful of peanuts - at Diva. The peanuts struck her hip, but they caught her attention and distracted her from the fight. Fraidy escaped to the veggie patch. Again I chased Diva off, fussing at her. I'm not sure what good that did, but it made me feel less helpless to do something.

Later, even though I hadn't seen Fraidy for a while, I figured she was still hiding over in the veggie patch. I called her name a few times and just as I was beginning to think it wasn't working, I caught the faintest sight of her ear moving behind a flower pot. I tossed a peanut over that way, and she emerged to eat it.

It had been an interesting night. Except for Diva, a lot of encouraging things had happened...except for Diva...

This is a real problem child, and becoming more so every day. And where was Rupert; did she lose him somewhere, or tell him to get lost and forget eating that night? What you're doing seems to be working beautifully, Cheryl; but it puts a burden on you to police while food is available. The only other alternative I can see is to try to live-trap Diva with marshmallows as bait, releasing anyone else you might catch in the process by mistake. Not a great option, but there are not a lot of options available: everyone else gets along pretty well or very well, and the food and water you provide them is invaluable. Policing is by far the easiest and least guilt-inspiring option, but a real time commitment.

Hi Ruth,

Oops! I can see now i have caused some confusion - and very glad you pointed it out so that I can "fix" it for everyone - Rupert was there. Those were the "left over" adventures from Thursday night split between 2 posts, the one about Rupert written on Thursday night in response to Carole's (Murmur) concern for him and the remainder written last night (really this morning). Oh, now I'm confused, too, just reading that last sentence back. No wonder there is confusion. ;-)

Anyhow, Rupert was there. His mom ignored him as usual. I called him over and fed him peanuts. After Diva's attack on Fraidy, Rupert approached her and she started snarling and growling at him. You're right, what a @##%%, e-hem, the 'B' word.

Diva caused even more trouble last night (Friday night). I thought of a couple of things to try.. Would love to get your thoughts on them. Will try to write them up later today or tonight. (For Rupert's sake in addition to all of the other reasons mentioned, I don't see relocation as a good option for her.)

Hi Cheryl. I'm hanging on every word of the saga, but it's taking a little while to download on dial-up. When you have a chance, please could you start a new thread for us technologically challenged folks?

June

Now that your aim is so good how are you with a slingshot or maybe a large straw and some small dried peas? If you shoot Dipstick, er Diva, in the rump or shoulder when she misbehaves do you think she would get it or do you think the other raccoons would become afraid of you?

LOL, tt, I like the pea-shooter idea! I know--shoot her with a tranquilizer dart, and while she's snoozing, put a shock collar on her! Then you can zap her when she misbehaves...just kidding, I know you can't do that.

i was thinking of one of those powerful water guns, a bigger version than what some people do to train their cats (of course Dipstick would be just like those few cats who grow to enjoy being hit with a firehose).

Now that sounds real do-able! LOL, "Dipstick".

Water gun should work well. We trained our dogs with squirt bottles, even the one that sort of likes it, knows he's in trouble when the sprayer comes out. Settles them down for the most part.

Hi Everyone!

June, Thanks for letting me know about that. I'll switch it after this post. (meant to do it last night but got sick again)

tetleytuna, hmm, sling shot, I hadn't thought of that. I'm going to put that on my backup list. Now that straw pea shooter sounds more difficult than it looks -- when used by the tribesmen of some place like Papa New Guinea and shown on National Geographic Channel. Just a few concerns: (1) How does one keep the pea in the straw until ready to shoot; I mean, considering that the pea will easily drop from either end of the straw? (2) I don't know if I can generate enough air pressure to "sting" from 12ft or so, not without practice (3) I'd probably end up swallowing the peas!

Ideally, I'd prefer not to do anything antagonistic around the raccoons, but I have seen some indication that Heidi and the kids might not be repelled by what they would see as a "spat" between Diva and me. (I don't think they like Diva very much anyhow!)

Renee' - You take the prize for suggestions! I LOVE that shock collar idea!!! FOTF! I had 2 ideas and the water gun was one of them. I have one of those blaster types that were popular with kids some 5yrs or so back.

Hyblaean, I was a little concerned that raccoons might enjoy it just because they love water so much, but I decided they probably wouldn't like having it squirted on them at high pressure quite so much as they like wading around in it.

Ok, now I'm going off to put together the new thread and us switch over.

(tt, the spellchecker converts your name to tetleytea, so if sometime I forget to undo it, hope you'll know what happened.)

Edited to add: Dipstick is a cute nickname for Diva.

This message was edited Sep 15, 2007 9:43 PM

Ok, due to the length of this thread we are moving to our new thread at: http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/t/771501/

Hope to see you all there!