The Lion of the Leylandii

I went down to the bottom of the garden to fill the feeder this morning, and had the eerie sensation of being watched from the trees. I looked but didn’t see anything for a while until I saw a contemptuous flick of a tail. Then the squirrel moved out of its hiding place at started staring at me. It could see me standing by the recently filled box and was getting impatient.

Those of us wise in the ways of the forest call it “the Lion of the Leylandii” – ok so the Leylandii is an urban menace, but I’m only pretending to be an expert about squirrels. You really don’t want to get in the way of an annoyed squirrel. The squirrel’s favourite method of attack is to break a man’s neck and then nibble on his nuts. As you can see below they’re fast, like a small furry ninja.

I’ve been meaning to test my camera for a little while, but haven’t really had the opportunity. The sound on the video surprised me, and the clicking to refocus means I’ll have to find the silent switch. The photo is an attempt at pseudo-HDR. HDR is a photographic technique to bring out more colour and detail in photos. Ideally you mix a few photos together, but the squirrel was far too fast for that, so I’ve tried reprocessing a .RAW image. It hasn’t been a huge success as far as I can tell as it looks like a .JPG file would to me. For more on HDR you should visit Why Don’t You Blog? which has a few posts on the subject.

I got the squirrel feeder from CJ Wild Bird Foods. They’re worth a visit at the moment as they’re giving away a free garden wildlife guide.