Squirrels in India are very bold. This fellow keeps coming in the window to try and help himself to my bird’s food. Thankfully, the bird’s tame enough not to be bothered and ignores him while continuing to eat.
Despite living in a heaving, huge city, I’m still surrounded by wildlife including this little guy who hangs out on my window.
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The squirrels in India creep me out! In Canada and the US, squirrels tend to have huge bushy tails that distinguish them significantly from mice/rats. In India, the squirrels don’t have bushy tails, which makes them look like little rats.
I have a cat who’d love it if a squirrel came to the window…though that would probably end with the squirrel’s untimely demise. I’m thinking of putting some seeds for the pigeons outside–would give my cat ample entertainment!
Your bird’s cage is adorable! Like a mini-bird apartment.
I call them rats with fluffy tails.
Yeah, the bird has a ladder, swing, and heaps of other stuff. He’s always playing around.
Oh, and one of the squirrels (probably the same darn one) leaped up onto the terrace this morning, and came running at me when I was drinking my coffee. Who knows what it wanted, but I fortunately scared it away!
Hi Sharell,
I love squirels as well the North American ones as the Indian !
Indeed, in india, they are very bold …
I once was with my niece in Balsamand Palace Garden in Jodhpur and the staff told her that if she didn’t move and hold seeds in her palms, all the squirels woulds come down the trees and feed in her hands.
She did what she was told and loved to see these tiny creatures coming all around her and even climbing on her arms …She was 11 at the time.
Now about squirels looking like rats, well at a some place in Jodhpur where rats were abundant, I once saw a crossbred ( half rat and half squirel ) !
Lots of people told me such a crossing was just impossible but I can assure you that the animal I saw was one ! Scary, he ?
Oh, I’ve stayed at Balsamand Palace!
There are trees full of bats there too.
Yes, lovely flying foxes : dozens of them !
We have a farm house right by the worli sea-face area with chickens, ducks and all sorts of trees and vegetation in our yard. We have bats, crows and parrots eating though all our fruits. Cats snatching away the baby chicks. We always keep slingshots ready and broke quite a few limbs of these bast@rds. We have shoo’d away owls in the dark because it is considered bad omen. Once, we had two moneys camping on a tamarind tree in the backyard; who knows where the came from but they went away.
We’ve had to put barb wires on our fence because of the kids who come looking for their cricket balls or climb our trees in the afternoon for gooseberrys and guavas.
Are you serious?! There’s a farm house near the Worli sea face?! I never would’ve thought there would be so much space left. Oh, you’re so fortunate! It would be blissful. 8)
It’s my mothers ancestral home. They belong to a community which is local to mumbai. Back during the raj, my grandfather would travel to thane to check up on his rice farms in the area. My mother actually grew up digging for shells and crabs in the sands of worli sea-face. It’s the same story with quite a few families in this area. These people have lived here in this one place for a looong time.
That is truly astonishing to think how much the city has changed.
You broke limbs of cats??? You could be booked for Cruelty to Animals! I am sure there are ways to keep your chickens safe without hurting other animals.
Super cute! I have a hallway cat, and a whole crew of toddlers who try to come in to ask for toffees
The ‘squirrels’ in India look like what we call ‘chipmunks’ in the US.
We have 8 cats so don’t experience much rodent activity around here.
I did have the opportunity to see a ‘red panda’ in Rara National Park once though, it doesn’t look much like a panda at all- about the size of a domestic housecat with a striped bushy tail & ringed eyes- more like an American racoon.
I think we need to get a cat or two. Between the rats and the squirrels, we’re overrun with rodents. There are often stray cats around here. You’d think they’d do a bit more about the rat problem at least.
I was just telling Raghavan that one of the benefits of bringing my cat to India would be all the rodents. She would get even fatter- based on what you’ve said about them.
Wonder why cats haven’t caught on more?
It’s kinda funny because we don’t have squirrels in Australia, so I really don’t know what a “proper” squirrel is like!
Here is one of an American squirrel I photographed in my backyard that always steals from by Cardinal feeder.
http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x1/cpgmm/IMG_1897.jpg
Awww, great photo! It looks to be quite a bit bigger than the Indian squirrels?
Well..if you like that, you should like this as well… I don’t need cages here. I get all kinds of awesome birds in my backyard.
http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x1/cpgmm/IMG_2282.jpg
http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x1/cpgmm/IMG_2561.jpg
http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x1/cpgmm/IMG_2341.jpg
http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x1/cpgmm/cropIMG_1549.jpg
The last one is a swallow. He/she was mad at me cause I had just torn down the nest he was starting to make in my front porch.
I let these fellas have their nest for like 4 or 5 years. Once they finish their nest and lays their eggs, I couldn’t tear it down. So I let it be but then they poop all over the porch. Last year, I painted by whole house and decided to keep a look out for these nests. This spring I caught them early. they had just started building the nest. I kept breaking it and then in another 15 minutes they come back and start all over. After several repeats they caught on. So they were just sitting there and giving me dirty looks. I got my camera and took that shot. Its one of my fav since I have their story for that look
There are some really cool birds there! My parents have swallows who have a nest under the entrance way to the back door of the house and they do make a mess, but my mum wouldn’t hear of them being “moved”. She loves them so much she won’t even put the outside light on at night when they’re sleeping. She’s got my dad to put up perches and everything for them as well.
I remember an incident. My dad was a farmer at heart and never gave up an opportunity to make a kitchen garden around the army quarters. I hated it, as he would ask me to collect cow dung around the quarters. And some of the boys hated me, for thier parents would make them aslo collect it, in retrospect, it is hillarious to imagine competition between the kitchen gardens.
I always was under impression that cats do not have as noble qualities as dogs. Then this stray cat came to our kitchen garden one day and we offered it something to eat, some milk. It stayed back in the kitchen garden, inviting us kids to tend her. Next morning it was tragic to see the cat dead, with its stomach cut open. We saw a huge field rat dead nearby and there was evidence of both fighting. Unfortunately both had died. I did help my dad to respectfully bury that cat.
Our kitchen garden was infested with rats and we had this trap which snapped and crushed the mouse, killing it. Squirrels or chipmunks are as destructive as any rodent. One day my dad, sister and myself were watching from the window, a squirrel slowly treaded towards the bait. It looked cute and my sister shouted to alarm it. The trap snapped but Squirrel escaped.
From that day, it learnt how to escape from that trap. It would touch and shake it..and then would eat the bait after the bait has snapped.
Very intelligent.
Inceidently one of my friend had found a squirrel baby, and it was super cute. It was bundle of enery and I still remember the sensation of its claws gripping your skin when it climbs on you or your fingers.
Lol! How fascinating. I got pictures of a squirrel on the neighbors terrace eating her beans but I’ve never seen one go in the houses yet. They run like crazy. I’m surprised that your squirrel is that bold. Maybe it’s because he’s a Mumbaite squirrel and not a Punjabi squirrel. jk. What an interesting story to tell though hahaha.
I tell ya, your mouse is nothing compared to the invasion going on here!
Sharell, remember those big rats back in the day?
I remember you mentioning getting attacked by a monkey too
Animals have a thing for you Sharell..with the squirrel having a go at you.
My Gramma hates squirrels. The next door neighbor keeps peanuts out for them and they take the peanuts and run over to her garden and dig up her bulbs to bury the peanuts. All year she finds peanuts everywhere she digs.
I have a short video of a fat American squirrel going crazy tearing apart a small cardboard box on my deck. I will have to find it and post a link to it sometime. It’s shaky though because I was giggling and couldn’t hold the camera still.
We used to have a golden retriever, and poor thing, one of the neighborhood squirrels figured out how to torment her, just for fun. Porky (we called him that because he climbed the allegedly squirrel-proof bird feeder and ate so much he went from slim to extra-chunky) discovered that if he sat on the outside of the glass door to the deck and tapped on the door, the dog would go BERSERK. He did that several times a day, just for fun, I swear — I guess it was the best game he’d ever discovered! It took several months of daily tap-tap-tap/BARK-BARK-BARKing before the dog finally gave up! It was great entertainment while it lasted, however.
Squirrels can be truly hilarious. They are also really sneaky and have a mischievous streak a mile wide. Are Indian squirrels the same way?
What type of birds are they?
Hi Sharell! Have been lurking on your blog for eons. Thought I’d say Hi. I love the little glimpses of Mumbai that I see through your blog. Makes me feel happy, warm and nostalgic.
Great Blog !
Living in India is like reestablishing our lost connection with nature.The struggle to survive goes beyond the rat-race of humans.There is also a rate-race for Rats… errr Squirrels ..!
Reminds me of college.Down south its considered lucky to be able to touch a squirrel.(Maybe some particular superstitious people).Anyways our chemistry lab was surrounded by trees and we have all sorts of birds and squirrels there.Some silly guys used to try to touch the squirrel and never succeeded .Their funda was that if they succeed they might get 100/100 in the lab exam.We girls always found this pretty silly and funny.In Nostalgic mood now.
Wow! I’ve lived in mumbai forever and never even so much as spotted a squirrel – I moved to ahmedabad for a short while and was both surprised and freaked out by all the squirrels, monkeys and other miscellaneous animals running around the city as if they own it. it’s kind of surprising though to actually see a squirrel in mumbai home.
So cute. You should leave a few nuts outside for it, that will make it happy and it will stay away from your bird.
Wow…So sweet rats… No, You Can’t Come and Eat My Bird’s Lunch
Pls leave some food for the hungry Squirrels.