Walter the squirrel

We have this squirrel that lives around our house. He's kind of a doofus. It's a good thing this is a predator-free environment, sometimes he makes enough racket in the trees that you'd think a couple of sasquatchi were getting it on. I call him Walter, in honor of Walter Sobchak. He's fat, noisy, but basically harmless, and if that isn't enough to earn the name, check this out:


He's also curious and if I'm out and about sometimes he'll just plunk down and watch me. Which affords me the opportunity to practice digiscoping if the birds aren't cooperating--which, lately, they ain't been.


Last Sunday afternoon, he was up on top of the telephone pole next to the driveway, chittering away at me in between breaks to groom his fur and--I am not making this up--scratch his pits. I hauled out my little scope and started snapping.


The lowest useful magnification my scope will do is 30x. To get this last shot, I had to open the gate to the back yard and go all the way to the end of the property just to get a wide enough field of view. That's a good problem to have.