As innkeepers, we’re used to seeing a few “unusual” guests come to us over the course of a season or two. Some of them have two-legs, but during the winter months especially, its not uncommon to find evidence in our garage of some of the four-legged variety, who come in from the cold and decide to stay. Its warm (plenty of tarps), dry and the best thing of all – there’s free food!

Yesterday, we encountered a new visitor. While preparing to take the trash down to the town transfer station, we were startled by a white streak flashing across the garage floor. Never having seen something this color before, we waited in silence for a few seconds, then the streak dashed back across the floor and headed straight into the pile of garden equipment. Quietly we waited again, then a beautiful little face popped up over the coiled garden hose to look at us. Its pointed nose, little black eyes and white, white fur coat gave the game away instantly and the black tip on the end of its tail confirmed it. Our first weasel!! How do we know? Well aside from looking in the critters book that Derrek has, I applied the old British adage:- how do you tell a weasel from a stoat? Well, weasels are weasily identified while stoats are stoatally different …..! Errrr!

The squirrel population is noticeably less since we got back from vacation. I imagine that most are tucked up warm in their nests snoozing off their fall feasts, most of which was generously provided by me! There is one however, that’s still out and about, and making the most of his last feeding days. I refer of course, to Robbie, the big bruiser who’s eaten enough this fall to feed an entire army. His girth is now something to behold and yet, just the other day, he was still stuffing his face as we prepared for the Christmas rush and yesterday’s first snow. There he was, sitting on top of one of the surviving pumpkins, (which is now soft from freeze/thaw) disemboweling the thing as if his life depended on it (which it probably does) and coming up time after time with his head covered in pumpkin juice. I managed to sneak up on him and take a picture … yes, that’s a full sized pumpkin!

Anyway, we’ll see how well he fares. Its not yet been very cold here, and the weather currently isn’t harsh enough to deter a very fat and determined squirrel, so I expect to see him around for a bit longer.

Probably the most prevalent of our resident wildlife are the grey squirrels which keep us ably entertained throughout the year. If the rumor’s true that you can tell how cold a winter you’ll have by how much the squirrels are eating, then we’re in for a real deep freeze this year!

First evidence of this was the seeds disappearing off the buckeye tree around the middle of September. No, the squirrels didn’t let them fall, but routinely collected them off the tree itself, stashing them wherever squirrels stash buckeye nuts. Next came the systematic demolition of my carefully arranged fall decorations, specifically the butternut squash which got torn apart within 24 hours of being out there. Those green thingys that look like turbans didn’t last much longer, nor did any of the acorn squash. Finally, having lost a face-off with Robbie – the largest and fattest of our squirrel bunch who I swear thinks I put a buffet out there especially for him – I was left with just three large pumpkins, complete with teeth and claw marks where a valiant effort had been made, and a mess of seeds and flesh.

So wrap up warm this winter? We’ll see ……