The last thing I expected when I took my break was a visitor any larger than the squirrels I was watching over the mounting plants in my kitchen window. It was pouring down rain but they were having such a good time.
But out of the corner of my eye I caught a glimpse of something almost the same color as the bale garden I have started out back. And whatever it was, was using the bales to hide itself.
At first, I thought it might be one of the neighborhood feral cats, but realized soon enough what I was seeing was too big to be a feline, although it was slinking up on my squirrels like one.
Momma squirrel in the yard with a new baby just a few feet away. Another baby, the one I was watching, on a limb.
Next thought- maybe a dog. But dogs don’t move like that.
It wasn’t a dog, but one of the local foxes.
He/she got about 50 feet from the squirrels, coming right at the house (and me) and I realize, 1) I don’t have my camera, and 2) this beautiful animal was about to make a meal out of one of my new baby squirrels.
I hate to have deprived that poor fox out of what was likely its meal of the day, but I couldn’t stand to think about that baby, right out of the nest, becoming lunch.
I rapped on the window. I then darted for my camera without even seeing whether or not the fox had stopped, or ran, or what.
When I returned to the kitchen window, camera in hand, two of the squirrels were laying flat against the tree about four feet off the ground. The other, still on the branch he was on to begin with, oblivious to the near loss of his family member going on below.
The fox was out to the edge of my yard ready to cross the lot behind me.
When I tried to raise the window to get a better shot, off he/she went, not wanting to see what made all that noise.
Good times. Love all the critters in my life.