BUT, tonight I got pictures of the woodchuck babies!! Yes, Virginia, more babies. There are three. Last night right before dusk I noticed that there were 3 woodchucks all eating in the garden at once. Usually they come one at a time. As I took a closer look, I saw that two of them were much smaller than the third. At that point I thought there were just 2 babies. Also this morning as I was leaving I scared one of the babies that was eating in the garden and it took off lickety split like its tail was on fire!
The pictures I got aren't very good because I took them through the storm door and it was just dark enough that the flash went off, reflecting off the glass. Also I had just taken down one of the bird feeders which requires a chair to stand on, and between the time I took the feeder down and was ready to put it back up, momma and the babies showed up and the chair is right in the way. They went right to where the chair was to get any 'leftovers' from the bird feeder. Here's mom with two of the babies, although in the first picture one of the babies is almost hidden by the arm of the chair.
Here are two of the babies 'grazing'.
Here is one of the babies catching the interest of a feral cat that hangs out in the neighborhood. I know it's not too original, but we call her Miss Kitty (in honor of 'Miss Kitty' on Gunsmoke). A few minutes later Miss Kitty had her back end going ready to jump on the baby, but the baby looked up and gave her a dirty look. Miss Kitty changed her mind.
And a few minutes after that, the baby woodchuck changed its mind and headed for the backyard and the safety of the hole under my shed. Hopefully, more photos to come.
Update: This all actually happened on Tuesday night. Wednesday morning I heard some scuffling going out outside my bedroom window and looked out to see three babies come out of the hole under my shed one by one, but then a FOURTH baby came around the corner of the shed. It was a little darker than the rest. (There are a total of four holes on three different sides of my shed.) Then I saw one of the feral cats starting to go after one of the babies. Think it was just playing, but the babies weren't so sure. Heard an alarm call from the other side of the shed and all the babies started running. Then momma woodchuck emerged from the hole and stood guard to make sure all the babies got safely back in the hole. She gave the cat a look that said, 'You better not mess with MY kids!'.
Then Wednesday evening I saw momma woodchuck take off when she saw momma raccoon approaching. One of the babies got caught between the side of the house and momma raccoon who was just interested in eating the cat food that was out. The baby's most direct path back to the shed was blocked by the raccoon. Thinking it was cornered, the baby charged the raccoon! Momma raccoon looked at the baby as if to say, 'What's your problem?' Probably if the raccoon hadn't been so used to eating cat food, baby would have become dinner. The raccoon then moved to another pile of cat food and the baby was able to get back to the hole under the shed.
Just love watching the drama unfold! It could keep me entertained all day long!
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