This morning, as on most mondays, my journey to work took me through Ellington Park. This is the park where I spent many happy hours as a child and I have very fond memories of it even though it is not as well cared for as it used to be (spending cuts have to happen somewhere).
I often see some of the squirrels that have made the park their home which I enjoy even though they are grey squirrels. In fact I can feel quite cross if dogs have chased all the squirrels up the trees and they are hard to spot. I am very well aware of the damage these grey squirrels do and that because they were ripped from their homeland our native squirrels have suffered. I took several pictures of the damage they were doing to the horse chestnut trees earlier this year.
Anyway as I entered the park this morning I couldn't see any dogs being walked but I couldn't see any squirrels either. Quite a few different species of bird around though - thrushes, blackbirds, etc. Then I heard a really strange call I looked up and searched the trees to see if I could find the bird that made it and saw a squirrel. I watched for a few moments and it was definitely the squirrel making the noise. There was a second squirrel in a tree nearby and to begin with I thought it was Territorial but as I walked towards the second tree I disturbed the large cat (domestic) that was lurking there. That explained all the fussing, dogs a bit of a pain but when the squirrel has made to and up a tree it is safe. Cats are a different matter.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8b-2TFrx3fg