Circle of Life

© Barry Troutman

© Barry Troutman

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I came home one day and heard a mysterious noise near our house that sounded like someone rasping with a metal file.  Finally tracked down the source of the noise - one of our resident Douglas squirrels sitting in a big leaf maple tree gnawing on a possum skull.  How you might ask, did it come to have a possum skull?  Because wildlife biologists (and their wives) do strange things, like bringing home interesting bleached-out bones from an old road kill.   We'd set the bones on our back deck the previous week and when they disappeared I thought perhaps a curious raven had carried them off.  Turns out that the squirrel, a nursing female, had discovered the bones and was delighted to have a source of calcium to gnaw on.  I watched as she worked away on the skull, then, wanting to make sure she didn't lose her precious find, ran up the branch and carefully buried the skull under a loose patch of moss.  Now I'm always on the lookout for small bones to bring home and place near the old maple.  Call it recycling.

This blog entry is dedicated to my young friends Hunter and Anabel who were so intrigued by this story.