Wildlife Are Gettting More Intelligent!
By villageanne
@villageanne (8553)
United States
June 24, 2007 7:34pm CST
We live in an area where there is lots of wildlife. My brother called me the other morning at about 3 AM and said “ I just saw a coyote crossing the road and coming down your way. We own the land nearly up to the road he was driving on. Scary.
One night I went onto the back porch and there was a opossum eating out of the cats food along side the cat. Neither one of them paid any attention to the other. They were just enjoying the food. This has actually happened many times. We have had skunks and raccoons on the back porch as well.
We have many deer in our yard every night. In winter they eat the evergreen vines that are on our front porch. These vines grow all the way up the rock porch.
We have bird feeders all around the property and we love to watch the birds. We have squirrel everywhere around our home also. My husband and I was on the back porch the other evening and he began to laugh. He had watched a squirrel go to the bird feeder and lift the lid and get inside to eat the seed. I just had to see this for myself.
I ran in and got the camera but we could not get close enough to really get a good shot without scaring the squirrel. I do not have a professional camera.This is one of the photos where you can see the Squirrel getting into the freeder with his head and part of his body. If you click on the photo you can see a larger version and it is plainer to see. Sure enough the squirrel actually lifted the clear plastic lid and stuck his head and most of his body into the feeder. These sure are smart wildlife we have around here. Now you know why this state is called “ Wild Wonderful West Virginia.
10 people like this
25 responses
@kgwat70 (13387)
• United States
25 Jun 07
Wildlife is getting more intelligent these days. I posted a picture of a squirrel thinking about jumping off my shed to get onto my bird feeder. He decided not to do because it must have been too far from him. They are always thinking of ways to try and get to the bird food. One squirrel got onto my bird bath and drank some water and then was planning on trying to jump up onto the bird feeder. They definitely have a mind of their own. It is just amazing.
4 people like this
@ElusiveButterfly (45940)
• United States
25 Jun 07
Wildlife adjusts to their environment. They do what is necessary to get by. Funny about the squirrel!
@keepermykitty (2573)
• Canada
25 Jun 07
You make me want to move there sounds beautiful .
I love wildlife ...
3 people like this
@estherlou (5015)
• United States
25 Jun 07
Wow! I loved reading this! I started laughing at the part about the cats eating side by side with the possum! Cats are so funny, but they do like to pick their friends! You live in a wonderful area. Glad to see all the pics you can send!
3 people like this
@cynddvs (2948)
• United States
25 Jun 07
My grandparents used to get coyotes in their yard all the time a few years ago. There is a big field right next to their house and there used to be llamas and miniature horses in this field. The coyotes killed off the llamas but the horse were left unharmed. The owner of the horses had to move them to the field closer to his house so he could watch out for coyotes. I never see much wildlife where I live besides squirrels, birds and the occasional racoons and opossoms. I would love living somewhere where I see deer in my yard every evening.
3 people like this
@AmbiePam (93771)
• United States
25 Jun 07
When I was in my mid-teens we moved into a different house in the same city. Right by our house was a sign that read 'deer crossing.' I just thought that was funny because no way was any deer going to be around where we lived, it just wasn't going to happen. I mean that road was well traveled, and even though houses weren't rampant on my side of the road, I just didn't think it would happen. But sure enough it did. I'd see them in the backyard and our front yard. I much prefer them to the skunk I smelled under the previous house we occupied in that same city.
2 people like this
@tdbrower1969 (1242)
• United States
25 Jun 07
That is too funny about the squirrel! We used to live in the country and we always had opossums that would eat with my cats and the stray cats. They did not seem to mind me when I came out and tried to shoo them away, so I finally quit doing that. We also had deer that would come into the front yard and snack on my irises. I think that the wildlife are becoming less and less afraid of humans for some reason.
@Thoroughrob (11742)
• United States
25 Jun 07
That is so cute. It is nice to see the wonders of nature. It is so true that they are getting smarter. We have 2 racoons that come up on our porch every night and scratch at the door and stir up our cat.
2 people like this
@GardenGerty (160883)
• United States
25 Jun 07
We have lots of wildlife around, even though we live in town. We are near the outskirts, but it is not limited just to our house. I will just tell one illustration, and I will leave it at that. We buy dog and catfood in bulk. There are lots of raccoons around here, and it is not unusual to see them. They like pet food. Because they could knock over the plastic hampers where we had food, and get to it, we bought an old fashioned metal can, with tight fitting lid. They could open it. We set a heavy tool box on top of it, and my husband came home late one night in time to see two raccoons work together to push the toolbox off, then push up the lid so they could eat. We resorted to wrapping a heavy bungee cord around the handle on the lid and hooking it in each of the side handles. They never figured that one out.
3 people like this
@byfaithonly (10698)
• United States
25 Jun 07
Sounds very much like where I'm living now except in Michigan. I got some shots of a deer yesterday in the back yard - this was after finding one had eaten all but 2 of my bean plants and my grandson's sunflower. Silly thing left foot prints all over the garden. I so love to watch them though and the most beautiful animal I know.
@lavenderbloom (1057)
• United Arab Emirates
25 Jun 07
It is very nice to stay so close to nature. Me and my husband really love places where we can see natural beauty, birds, cats, etc. They are all so natural. I am from UAE, so all these creatures are never seen here. The life here is so hectic and stressful that we really feel the need to be in a different country where there is lot of greenery and cute animals and birds, and lot of pavement area where we can walk freely with our kids. I really hope one day we move to other country and enjoy the nature.
@Teenjack (1)
• Mexico
25 Jun 07
I think wildlife as all the environment is changing due to the fact that we humans are using more of the space they used to have. I dont have a great point of view at this topic because I live on the city so the wildlife is very scarce, but I have had the oportunity to travel to other parts of my country in the last few months and I have seen beautiful places where wildlife co-exists with human-life and I think this is an important thing, sometimes we dont realize we are the ones that are invading the wildlife and that we need to return something to them
@Willowlady (10658)
• United States
26 Jun 07
It is not really that they are getting more intelligent, it is really that we are so more numerous that they are taking advantate like they would normally do in any other situation. We are around more to see them do the fine things that they do. They are animals however they were given brains and it is wonderful to see. Wish we people would use our brains more. lol
1 person likes this
@emeraldisle (13139)
• United States
25 Jun 07
I'm getting a red x for the picture :( but I can believe it since I've seen squirrels take food out of bird feeders before.
Now I wish I had gotten a picture of what was in our garage one day. We have one cat that likes to go in and out so we'll keep a bit of food in a dish for him out there. Now this is just dry cat food. The one morning out there the cat is sitting eating his food there and right beside him is a very large toad eating cat food as well. I'm talking a toad that is bigger then your hand. They could care less that they weren't the same at all. They kept eating. We've had the toads stealing the cat food often, they will sit in the bowl and just eat. Strange.
2 people like this
@KrisNY (7590)
• United States
25 Jun 07
You guys do have intelligent wildlife- I don’t know if I can say the same- I see squirrels all the time and possums. The dogs bark and go crazy and chase them- Lately the last few nights we have had Black Bears in our yard- We are out in the country- Tell me if that isn’t scary- 3 nights ago driving home from a ball game- I said to my daughter what is that in the road? A Big dog- As we got closer it was a bear- Just calmly walking down the road- It was a main road! It started to run into the woods when we got closer- Friday night we were eating dinner and saw the biggest black bear I’ve ever seen- He was on all 4 running right in our yard- I was scared! I got the dogs inside and we watched it from the porch (enclosed)- My daughter was impressed- I can’t believe we saw 2 only a couple of days apart- We live in Western NY. It is illegal to hunt bear in my town- Not that we would- but I’m even afraid to go outside at dark now-!
1 person likes this
@AmbiePam (93771)
• United States
25 Jun 07
It seems squirrels are everywhere. There is one in particular the people in my apartment complex have adopted, and they call him Frank. I wondered if I'd ever be able to tell which one he was, and they said oh, you'll know Big Frank when you see him. And they were right. I DID know him when I saw him.
In my mid teens years for a time we raised a couple cows and a bull. If you knew me you'd think that was weird because we didn't really live in the country, and my family wasn't all into doing into that in the first place. But anyway, one day I was feeding the cows and their eyes got huge! So I slightly turned to see what they were staring at, and it was a coyote. He just trotted on by me, six feet away. I was pretty surprised.
2 people like this
@66jerseygirl (3877)
• United States
26 Jun 07
I love it. those squirrels are quite smart. I have seen those critters up close and personal back home. it was just amazing to see how intelligent these creatures are
@2wicelot (2945)
•
26 Jun 07
I think what is happening here is not the wild life getting more intelligent but it is because of humans encraoching into their territory that makes them more aware of what humans do and stuff like that. I remember watching a movie some years back about a plane that crashed deep in an African jungle. When they tried to scare the animals away, they just stood still and did not even bother to move. They have not seen humans before so theywere not afraid of them.
