Wildlife, Nature, and Photography

Eye to Eye With a Squirrel

My latest wildlife encounter in the forest

These quirky little animals are just adorable. I don’t know how one could not like squirrels. But then again, where I live, they are rather shy and hide in the forests. They do live in the cities as well and are tamer in city parks. But since I’m not much of a city person and try to avoid those places as much as possible I only get to experience squirrels on my hikes in the forest.

I am well aware that squirrels can be a problem and have heard about it before. But then maybe don’t feed them if you live in such an area struggling with an overpopulation of squirrels. But let’s not rant.

Let’s celebrate my latest encounter with a little fella that even gave me a chance to take some close-up shots.

I was about to meet a friend of mine I hadn’t seen for over a year when I arrived at our meeting point earlier and decided to walk through the neighboring forest instead of just sitting around and waiting.

I was shooting things on the floor and in the air while looking for the first signs of fall when all of a sudden I heard a rustling in the undergrowth, saw a bushy tail disappearing, and then the body of the squirrel climbing up the tree.

This is usually where my encounters with squirrels end. Too shy to explore anything, they vanish onto and into the treetops before I even get a glance at them.

I’ve had one close encounter in the forest before where I’d been sharing a few intimate minutes with a squirrel that seemed to trust me. But that day it happened I did not have my camera on me, so I couldn’t capture the special moment.

This time, when I realized it’s been a squirrel I didn’t just have the camera with me but was carrying it in my hands. Unfortunately, I had the wide-angle lens on my camera and still decided to try to shoot this quirky animal before the chance was gone. One can see the bushy, red tail amidst all the green.

Then I remembered the backpack on my back which actually carried the right lens. I quickly placed the bag down, swapped out lenses, and stood back up again. Staring at the squirrel.

It hadn’t even twitched an eye.

The squirrel seemed unimpressed. It was sitting on the cut-off branch of this large tree, partly hidden from countless leaves which were swinging in the wind. I quickly took a shot, before the chance was gone.

But then I realized this fella was in no rush to go anywhere and I could take my time in shooting some more. Unfortunately, a fence was separating me from the tree which might be the reason why the squirrel felt so secure.

It wasn’t easy shooting despite the right lens by now, since the branches with leaves were always swinging into my picture. I decided to walk around and capture the scene from the front. It wasn’t what I expected but it was surely not a bad result.

The squirrel seemed frozen in his position but surely knew about my presence. His eyes were following every step I was doing but he kept on posing for me.

So here is my thank you to this little fella who posed for me so patiently and allowed me to shoot him from different angles. I was in awe of this special moment.

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