Originally posted by Sam_I_am I was looking around to see where the best place would be to install a squirrel feeder when it occurred to me that in the six years I have lived in this house, I have never seen one squirrel. Raccoons, Possums, Skunks, Deer, Owls, even one small black bear....no squirrels. We do have many neighborhood cats though. The neighbor behind me is a birder and he has his feeders out and I see lots of birds, just no squirrels.
We live in a modern "open concept" house - entry hallway, dinette, living room, then glass sliding door to the deck - where we can see the back deck from the entry hallway.
The house then sits about ten feet off a wooded hillside that leads up to the Bypass. The Squirrel and Bird Feeders are on the edge of the hillside.
I choose to fill the Feeders once per day, although I could fill the Squirrel Feeder several times.
Our Squirrels show interest in both Feeders, although we have a "Squirrel proof" Bird Feeder that gives them problems.
We sometimes attract Deer and Raccoons - although the Deer were coming for ivy on the hillside before we put up the feeders - sometimes they play 'pinata' with the bird feeder.
This year - for the first time in the seven years we have lived here - the Squirrels have wandered up onto the deck - perhaps because I now fill a 16 oz plastic cup on the deck and then transfer food to the Feeders.
Yesterday, while we were having Sunday dinner, we noticed several Squirrels seeming to come up to the door and look in at us.
I took the below photos from a rocking chair just on the living room side of the glass door.
added: our ten-year old cat looked for a quieter place to rest, but our fourteen-month
kitten cat was very excited to be within a dozen feet or less of these strange creatures.