North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[BekeeprTop@aol.com]

Oft I hear the argument, "if you kill squirrels, more squirrels will move in".   Absolutely true of course.   But when the harvest is proceeding, the reason to kill squirrels then is to eliminate the ones who are onto your crop.   

For those who don't like P of P, a Havahart trap baited with peanut butters catches squirrels quickly.   Then drop the cage in nearest river.   I don't like this part of fruit growing, but I paid the taxes, the squirrels didn't.   Once harvest ends, there is no need for squirrel killing to continue.   If you think there is any relief from this killing, forget it, if you don't do it yourself, you're just paying a commercial grower to do it for you.   And even if you are a vegetarian you can't harvest crops where rodents feed unless you kill or find a predator-animal to kill for you.   

I never knew till last year a squirrel could pilfer chestnuts on the tree until last year when I saw a squirrel hauling off an entire closed 3-chestnut burr of Luvall's Monster - a cluster of considerable size - and chestnuts are the only nut that on the tree can resist squirrel.   Well I thought so until I saw the squirrel hauling off the entire burr, larger than the squirrel itself.   
Charlie Paradise, Massachusetts