The Garden Fence - proper Old Style support and chat!

burtha

Florence,  your guests sound like they have had a party .. destructive tree rats  . glad you got rid, despite the large bill . 

trying to get some motivation to go to work , .. 2 more days then I'm on holiday   
my book came yesterday so that's good news . 

Enjoy your day everyone x 

MingVase

I saw a squirrel walking along the top of my back fence yesterday, Not mad keen on them but there's worse things out there.
Just found out the plant I've been feeding and petting and talking to for weeks is plain old horrible Goldenrod. I HATE yellow!! Will leave it till the flowers die then it has got to go. I bought some fancy stuff and thought it was one of them until it hit 5ft and turned yellow...

pollyanna_26

Morning just about Fencers. I'm ashamed to say I've not long woken up. The sleepless nights finally caught up with me. Youngest hasn't been feeling too good so we were emailing back and forth into the early hours.

I hope your wrist isn't bothering you too much VJs. I managed to break two toes last year and they haven't healed properly. I think Floss mentioned recently she'd broken one and it still hadn't either. If it wasn't bad for the environment I'd suggest we made ourselves special Fencers bubble wrap outfits.

burtha I can't see us seeing an end to Poverty and hardship in our lifetime. Too many haves not caring about the have nots for much to be done to alter the situation. It's lovely to see how happy you are now the waste of space has gone..It's a shame he dragged things out for so long but look how your life has changed since you first told us about him taking off. Your Frog sounds a lovely man and you deserve lovely people in your life after the hard time you had. Hope youngest dd is ok, happy and moving forward.

I need to make a drink. I'll be back.

pollyx

Florenceem

I think squirrels are cute - just not keen on them having a dance in the loft at 5am.
Finished last of the 20 snakes I made for the craft fair. Almost finished making jellyfish - then I need to work on caterpillars.

maryb

We had to have a tree near the house cut back fairly hard because the squirrels seemed to think our chimney cowl was a giant bird feeder and they would take a flying leap from the nearest branch  Fortunately for them, only in summer when the fire was out. They would fall down the chimney and we would hear scrabbling, so we had to open the woodstove doors and all the doors leading to the outside then a little black face would eventually appear and there would be a mad scramble round the room over all the sofas leaving soot everywhere before they were chased outside.

I hate squirrels

Nargleblast

I remember an overnight stay in Sri Lanka years ago. My hotel was right by the sea, it was beautiful. However, there were squirrels, seemingly millions of the little blighters. All on the beach, in the road, in the hotel grounds. They were considered a pest, like mice or rats here.

pollyanna_26

I lost a long post earlier , then the landline calls began. I'm going to try shorter posts. Florence and Maryb we don't see squirrells here they're some miles down this 20+ miles of protected coastline. Under the protection of the National Trust and others. We've often been to visit them over the years and they're nothing like the greys which are a constant threat as they carry disease and are quite a nasty threat  both to the health of the reds and are likely to attack the babies.

The reds have always needed protection from some members of the public too. Since the beginning of the pandemic it,s been a nightmare for the wardens. Hordes of people from all over the place have arrived the length of this coastline even during lockdown- fires are banned. We had a large convoy of taxies all the way from Co Durham. They lit Bannned BBQ's, knocked back the Banned Alcohol , lit fires in the reserve and on all the beaches .

The whole thing has been a nightmare not only for the squirrells. Everywhere has been trashed , coastguards, lifeboat etc searching for little children their drunken parents didn't notice had wandered off.

Emergency services have been run ragged trying to turn back the hordes and resorted to bringing in the police horses a number of times. Not many people will take them on, they would die to protect the man or woman they spend theeir working life with.

On a nicer note we have a lot of Owls or as youngest has called them since childhood Wols too much Winnie the Pooh in childhood and since there.

I've never met a bad Wol. They live in the trees I often see them flying about when I put the milk bottles out at night. Many don't seem nocturnal any more.

Theres a very big tree opposite dds boyfriends and we often stand watching them on a sunny day. Big ginger cat usually joins us his head is going in all directions but he hasn't attemped to get one. I think the day he managed to get a very big seagull in through the cat flap must be his limit. Thankfully the seagull was finally captured in a tea towel and released outdoors and lived to fly another day.

We don't see much about the Wols but on local news there were two different Wol events in the  past few months . A local man heard something coming down his flue. Thankfully the fire was unlit. A very big owl stood blinking at him and jumped up onto the mantlepiece. It was released outdoors, seem to remember RSPCA or other animal rescue was involved.

When he went downstairs the next day it was back on the mantlepiece looking like a very large ornament. There were pictures of it and it was so funny. They got it out again and he had to put something over the chimney outlet.

A few weeks later a young womaqn woke up tp find an Owl next to her on the pillow. It looked like the original one but they were never sure. There was some Owl phobia doing the rounds. Youngest would have adopted one if it happpened to her but thankfully it didn't.

pollyx

monnagran

I've just looked back to find the post I carefully crafted this morning.  It seems not to be there and can't remember what gems you have been deprived of..

We have red squirrels here and they are carefully preserved.  Squirrel Nutkin personified.  Or squirrelified.

The day has now got away from me and I've done nothing I intended.  So much for a day off.  I sat down after lunch and went to sleep and am now very cross.

Polly, I once taught an owl to count to 3.  I hooted once, it hooted once.  I hooted twice, it hooted twice.  I hooted 3 times, it hooted 3 times.  After that it lost the plot and if I hooted 4 times it went on hooting until owl laryngitis set in.

Now I'm going to make a cup of strong coffee and try to wake myself up.

mothernerd

I love owls. Mum and I went to the Pontefract Liquorice Festival a few years back and there was a stand with owls which you could hold (they had about 6 of them, one kestrel too). The people were talking about the owls they had and then the man asked would anyone like to hold one. Me please, I said. You went to the back of the stand, they gloved you up, picked which owl you wanted to hold (I had the very large one) and then they handed it to you. I stroked it's head but the man said they weren't keen on that but loved having their chest feathers stroked. So I did that, telling him how beautiful and magnificent he was. Some people had photos taken but I didn't bother. I would like to go to one of the owl sanctuaries but it would have to be as part of a coach tour as they tend to be in out of the way places and I would have difficulty getting there by public transport.

I presume you are talking about Formby polly. I went there probably 35 years ago (I only had DS1 and I was still feeding him). Our coach (rattling old bus which should probably have been condemned) was the only one there and the children we had were quite young so it was quiet and peaceful. I read a few years ago about a flu epidemic that they were worried was going to wipe them out, but a year later the wardens recognised that some of the red squirrels they knew had had the flu, had survived and were stronger than ever (a little bit battered but they recovered).

MingVase

I've kept and bred owls, they're lovely wee things.