Doubly morbid discovery

[urbpan]

"What is that?!" yelled Nicole. I couldn't tell. I got up close and looked--well, I'll be...



Kind of hard to tell what it is at this distance. Nicole said "Is it a baby bear? a baby raccoon?"



Once I was closer, I could tell what it was.



It helps that I have seen live black squirrels in the area before.



But it doesn't explain why it died half-hanging out of a hole.

Comments

[octogirlie.livejournal.com]

But it doesn't explain why it died half-hanging out of a hole.

Creepy. I suspect either the hand of man, or it found it was too large to escape the tree.

[urbpan.livejournal.com]

My theory is that some predator wounded it, and it made it into the hole only to die of its injuries later, as it came out to gasp a final breath. Dramatic, no?

[wakarusa.livejournal.com]

that seems an extremely un-squirrel way to die. maybe something caught it and it made it back to the hole somehow, but was too far gone. An owl might have smashed it against the trunk, too. although if that were the case, I would think the top half of the squirrel would be missing or tattered. looks pretty whole.

could it have gotten poisoned?

[urbpan.livejournal.com]

I agree with one of your theories (see above).

[momomom.livejournal.com]

Uck, I ran across 2 dead deer while hiking today. The tops of the heads had been removed for the antlers and the remainder was left to 1) block the trail 2) stink up the area 3) wastefully rot when we have a wonderful state wide and well publicised "venison for the needy program" that only requires hunters to field dress and transport the carcass to a listed butcher. The butchering and distribution of the meat is all taken care of at no cost to the hunter.

It really pissed me off, thank you for the chance to vent.

[wakarusa.livejournal.com]

we have that problem a lot where I live. very unpleasant.

[aemiis-zoo.livejournal.com]

Wow...that's really evil. My dad hunts, but thankfully he keeps the deer and uses all the meat. That seems awfully wasteful to just kill an animal for its antlers and leave it there to rot. I have never heard of such a thing before. =(