Crazy Squirrel

LIVE2HUNTNFISH · 10-29-2003, 11:34 PM

A few weeks ago, during the beginning of archery season here in Ar., a Game Warden and i were tracking a deer that i had shot that morning. While following the blood trail we noticed that we were being closely followed by a squirrel. The squirrel would stay within 10 feet of, every step we took. He eventually jumped off a tree and ran across the game warden' s feet. We thought this was very odd but dismissed and kept following the blood trail. A few minutes later we were standing on a gravel road at the edge of the property, trying to pick up the trail again, we noticed that the squirrel had followed us on to the road. The squirrel again ran towards us and this time jumped up on my pants leg and looked at me. He never attacked us, he just seemed curious as to what we were. We thought that maybe he had been raised as a pet but this seemed highly unlikely where we were. My question to all of you is, has this ever happened to you and if so , why do you think it would act like this? If you have any ideas they would be much appreciated.THANKS

coyote caller · 10-30-2003, 05:05 AM

Never had that happen to me with a squirrel. But I did have it happen to me with a deer. I was hunting an Island in Lake Michigan, called Beaver Island. We were coming back to camp from town when I spotted something in the woods. I told my friend to stop and let me out, because i wa curious as to what I saw. He kept telling me it was just a rabbit. But I still wanted to see for myself.

AS I walked up to it I saw that it was I small yearling doe. Curious as to how close I could approach the deer. I kept walking up to her. Well she just stayed laying down and never seem to be scared. She kept cleaning herself and hardly watching me. Well I finally was close enough to pet her, so I decided why not.

She actually seemed to enjoy being petted, so I stayed with her for around 20min. then decided to walk back to camp. Well when I turned around the doe was following me back to camp. When I got back to camp I told my friend that a deer was out here to go and get his bow. I thought he was going to bring the tent down trying to get out. When he finally got out of the tent, he asked me where the deer was. When I show him the deer standing next to me, we both had a great laugh.

Well she stayed around the camp for most of the night. And layed down between us by our fire that night. We fed hed about a half a loaf of bread. then decided to call it a night. The next morning she was gone and we never saw her again. The only thing we could think of was someone had her as a pet and released her to the wild.

LIVE2HUNTNFISH · 10-30-2003, 06:24 AM

That' s neat to hear a story like that about a deer,since they are usually so timid. I don' t know what some animals are thinking sometimes. The place where I encounterd the squirrel is probably 50 yrds. from my stand overlooking my food plot that is in the middle of the woods. I have the same routine every morning,first I walk to my stand and run deer off that are bedded down in the same place every morning(10 yrds from my stand), then at 7:30 the same doe and two fawns stroll through, next at 8:00 a great horned owl gets in a tree 10 yards in front of me and stares at me for 5 to 10 minutes, and then later i have to run the same 2 squirrels out of my tree everyday. It' s like the movie (Groundhog DAY).

Red Hawk · 10-30-2003, 11:16 AM

I never had anything like that happen to me. Only thing i can say that is close to that was when my dad and a few of our friends went pig hunting. There was a young coyote that followed us around for a few minutes. One of our friends took a shot at it but missed. Didnt come around us anymore after that lol. Those are both good stories that you mentioned. My guess on the squirrel was it was a female looking for a good pair of nuts lol (sorry, had to say that) just kidding. I guess it was probably just curious and never encountered humans that much before. As for the doe. I' d say either a pet one time or another or just never encountered humans before either.

Hector500 · 10-31-2003, 01:59 AM

My mother had a pair of pet squirrels that she released to the wild. That sounds like how they' d act around different people.

Tree climber · 10-31-2003, 08:12 PM

most likely a pet someone released or it got away.