The Chipmunk and the Blue Jay

Recently we decided to open up our feeders in the backyard now that the birds are starting to come back and overwhelm our house feeders we fill during the winter.

We love filling the feeders together and Puddie loves when I make him a little tub of feed to sprinkle throughout the yard for our ground critters and birdies. The squirrels, chipmunks, crows, blue jays and other ground feeders love to gobble up corn, peanuts and sunflower seeds AND we love that it keeps them from climbing up the bird feeder poles and tearing things down.

This tub is Mikey’s absolute favorite. He makes a big deal of parading around the yard and makes it the grand finale of every evening.

However, on this particular day, just as we were finishing up all the work, the wheelbarrow fell over and dumped his finale tub all in one spot! Oh. NOOOOO!

We made the best of it and spread things a little BUT there was still a huge stock pile in the middle of the yard. Some little fellar was going to find a gold mine this evening.

Enter Chip. We weren’t on the deck but a few minutes and this little chipmunk sprang into action. He beelined straight for the stash and started loading up.

I was enjoying watching Chip and listening to the birds. Then suddenly I heard a call I did not recognize so I pulled up my app and very quickly saw that it said a Red-Shouldered Hawk was making that call!

Oh. NOOOO!!! Run, Chip. RUN.

And run he did.

I kept scanning the sky.

But no hawks appeared.

We don’t usually see a lot of hawks at our feeders because we are surrounded by fields of better hunting ground with no humans to worry about.

But I kept hearing the hawk every time Chip started for the stash.

Then, I looked up and in a nearby tree I saw one of our Blue Jays doing his best imitation of a red-shouldered hawk’s call before swooping down to get himself some of the peanuts out of Chip’s stash.

Now truth be told, Jay performed this Oscar award winning performance several times before Chip caught on!

But when he did, he started ignoring Jay and pretty soon Jay saw the gig was up and stopped making the call.

In the end, I guess they decided there was enough for everyone.

I just love nature. It was so interesting and fun to see this play out in my backyard.

But then it hit me.

How many times are we like Chip?

Minding our own business.

Maybe even having a really good day or a enjoying a found treasure.

And, suddenly a little voice starts telling us lies that completely disrupt us.

Maybe that voice comes from inside or maybe that voice comes from someone who wants to take our peanuts…

Not today, Jay. Not. Today.