It was during two weeks "holiday" from work whilst putting up a new fence in the garden. I was on about the twentieth post hole digging in the hard rocky clay having tried a manual auger, petrol driven auger and resorted to just digging with a chisel type bar! Between my neighbour and I are several Leylandii and three huge Poplar trees and it was at this point I was digging the post hole and spotted a small bald moving object on the ground under the tree.
At first I thought it was a mouse or rat. It was about 2 1/2 inches in length, pink hairless body, long tail, two large eyes that were shut tightly and two small ears that hadn't formed properly and appeared stuck to the side of his head! His face was squarer than a mouse and he had obvious whiskers and small square nose.
On closer inspection I realised it can only be a baby squirrel who must have fallen from his nest. He had no apparent injuries but was very cold. I took him into the house to my wife who at first sight reluctantly took him from me not entirely convinced it was a squirrel. This was mainly due to the rather demonic appearance he presented!
My wife kept him warm whilst I attempted to find the nest with the intention of attempting to return the unfortunate animal to his undoubtedly concerned parents. I climbed up one of the Leylandii to what I thought may be a nest. It was about 20 ft from the ground but once there realised that whilst made of twigs was nothing more than a small platform and nothing like a nest. I eventually managed to climb back down, a feat much more difficult than the ascent, and returned to find out how the little fellow was.
Having been unable to locate the nest the delemma was what to do with him! I could take him back and leave him where I found him but no doubt the neighbour's cats would soon discover the afternoon appetizer. He was also cold and if the cats didn't get him I doubted that he would survive too much longer being left alone. This only left the unenviable option of attempting to hand rear him.
So it was to the internet that we sought advice. Sure enough, a quick google search on "baby squirrel" found a plethora of websites brimming with information on hand rearing baby squirrels. So, armed with all the information of I went to buy puppy lactol, a syringe and Pedialyte. I didn't really know what Pedialyte was other than it was for dehydration and discovered that I couldn't find it in the pet shop. After re-reading the website I realised it was for human babies but still couldn't find it in the Isle at Tescos! I settled for Dioralyte but unfortunately could only find blackcurrent flavour. He didn't like Blackcurrent flavour!
I later found a pro biotic from the pet shop that would suffice. From the website I calculated the baby to be about 4 weeks old and armed with the information set about making feeds and preparing to start a four hourly feeding regime! It was a long time since I did night time feeds with both my kids being much older!!
Now we had embarked on this adventure it was time to give our adopted son a name. Oh yes, he was a boy. The internet tells you how to sex baby squirrels but to tell you the truth it was blatently obvious!
My wife chose the name Donald James (DJ) after her dad who passed away several years ago. It just so happened that we found DJ on her dads birthday. The other coincidence was that her dad had a serious fall from height himself earlier in life which unfortunately left him with a broken back. Little DJ was rather more lucky and seemed to have no injuries.
I later found the nest he had fallen from. It was over 60 ft from the ground in the Poplar. There was no possible way of getting to it to return him. The only reason that we could think of for his lack of injury was that in falling he landed on the branches of the Leylandii, wandered on it then dropped to the next branch and so on until eventually landing at the spot where he was found.
