The battle with the squirrels and acorns

It's funny how a simple walk across the lawn can bring back memories.

We have several large, old oak trees in our yard. This fall the ground is filled with acorns -- much more than in past years. I've watched the squirrels hoard the nuts. I suppose they are readying for either the worst winter ever or one with little snow at all, depending on which prognosticator you would believe.

King and I don't pay too much attention to the acorns. They keep the squirrels busy and out of the bird feeders and I guess that's a good thing. I think our neighbor stays up nights working on plans to keep them out. I've seen him put cages around the feeders (it gives the squirrels a place to rest as they reach in to spirit away the seeds); I've seen him use expensive squirrel guards (they don't work) and I've even watched as he electrified the feeders (I don't get it either).

My parents were as adamant about keeping squirrels out of their bird feeders as well. I think the best deterrent  was Mom's wooden spoon.

They had a bird feeder hanging outside their kitchen window. Mom could wash dishes and watch the birds eat as she was working. Apparently one day an enterprising squirrel climbed down from the roof and onto the feeder. Mom said he appeared to enjoy swinging on the feeder as much as he did stealing the food inside. Regardless, having the little thief stealing from her right before her eyes would not do, so she quietly slid the window open and wrapped the the offensive thief on the nose with a wooden spoon.

"He just ran off and rubbed his little nose, but came right back for more," Mom said.

It's not as if my parents were opposed to squirrels. They set out food for them as well, but I guess the squirrels had a difficult time distinguishing between their food and the food for the birds.

If Mom and Dad didn't like squirrels and birds co-mingling their food, they abhorred the abundant acorns that filled their yard each fall.

When I was growing up we had a mixture of oak and maple trees in our yard. Toward the end of October Mom would announce that the upcoming Saturday would be leave raking day. We were all expected to pitch in and help rake leaves. It was a big yard. But fortunately back then leaves could still be burned and we would have several piles burning in our gravel driveway and would roast hot dogs over the fire for lunch. I still love the smell of burning leaves.

Mom had a little pronged stick which she would use to dig acorns out of the lawn. She didn't want seedlings starting to add to our front yard forest, and she also maintained the acorns damaged the grass. She didn't spend a lot of time on it, but she did remove many of the offending nuts.

When they moved to their first retirement home, their yard was kept natural, so the acorns were not much of a concern.

Then came the second move. Mom and Dad once again had a large yard filled with oak trees. An invitation to visit them in the fall meant one thing: time to rake the leaves. By this time Mom and Dad were in their 80s and truly needed all the help they could get. So we were happy to do it. But there was no pleasant smell of burning leaves -- they had to be bagged and hauled away. And there were a lot of them. One round of raking netted us 90 bags. And that was simply round one.

And Mom and Dad absolutely obsessed about the acorns. Dad bought a lawn vacuum. Now these things are touted to be the best thing in the world for sucking up and mulching leaves. In theory it probably works. But my parents yard was sometimes buried under a foot of wet, slippery oak leaves. There wasn't a Hoover built that could put a dent in their yard. Instead Dad used his vacuum to suck up acorns after the lawn was raked. He would store those bad boys in their garden shed by the bushel -- many, many bushels. Had we been thinking we could have bagged the up and sold them to craft supply stores and made a small fortune.

So as I walked across our yard today, kicking the acorns as I went, I thought about grabbing a handful to give to Mom on my next visit. I quickly discarded the idea. On the off chance she would remember how hard she and Dad worked to rid their yard of them, bringing her some now simply would not seem right.