Post 23875
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The primitive man slaughtered storm-bound animals, but civilized man rescues them. A deep snow offers a good opportunity for more intimate acquaintance with our wild neighbors. And snowy times, too, are good picture-taking periods. In snowy times, if our wild neighbors already respect us, tempting food and encouraging hunger will place big, shy, and awkward country fellows and nervous birds close to the camera and close to our hearts.
About a score of chipmunks have their homes in my yard. They are delightfully tame and will climb upon my head or shoulder, eat nuts from my hand, or go into my pockets after them. At times three or four make it lively for me. One day I stooped to give one some peanuts. While he was standing erect and taking them from my fingers, a strange dog appeared. At once all the chipmunks in the yard gave a chattering, scolding alarm-cry and retreated to their holes. The one I was feeding dashed up into my coat pocket. Standing up with fore paws on the edge of the pocket, and with head thrust out, he gave the dog a tempestuous scolding. This same chipmunk often played upon the back of Scotch, my collie. Occasionally he stood erect on Scotch to sputter out an alarm-cry and to look around when something aroused his suspicions.
Chipmunks are easily tamed and on short acquaintance will come to eat from one’s hand. Often they come into my cabin for food or for paper to use for bedding. Occasionally one will sit erect upon my knee or shoulder, sometimes looking off intently into the yard; at other times apparently seeing nothing, but wrapped in meditation. More often, however, they are storing peanuts in their pouches or deliberately eating a kernel. Rarely is the presence of one agreeable to another, and when four or five happen to call at the same time, they sometimes forget their etiquette and I am the centre of a chipmunk scrimmage.