Tit for tat and the fury of a squirrel with an Einstein brain
PAUL JOHNSON
Professor Pepperberg, a delightful lady from MIT, told an American conference last week that she can teach a parrot, Alex, to recognise 50 objects, to count, to think logically and to connect speech with action. She thinks that birds are as brainy as chimps and other high apes. I have been thinking a lot about birds and other creatures recently, as a result of adding to the amenities of the library in my London house.
This is a long, narrowish room, running the entire depth of the building. I love this room and regard it as the nicest I know. Books line one entire wall from floor to ceiling, and half of the wall opposite, the rest being taken up with paintings, of which I have managed to cram in 27. The other two walls are windows, one looking out into the leafy street, a mass of colours and blooms in spring and summer, and still greenish in mid-winter. The south wall consists of two enormous French windows, which open on to a balcony. From this balcony I had built a spiral staircase that leads down into the garden and my studio. The vine, an amazing plant which grows around the balcony and produces a mass of small black grapes in autumn, has taken over the staircase too, just as it has crept up luxuriantly on to the roof above. My armchair, near the French windows, gets the sun from breakfast to supper time, and everywhere I look I can see nothing but nature and greenery, books and paintings — a civilised cordon sanitaire keeping the horror world of London at a distance and out of sight.
To add to the delights of this room, we put a caged box of nuts on a nail in the wall of the balcony for the birds to peck through its meshes. And they did, clinging precariously to the vine while they feasted, looking around anxiously between each tiny, rapid mouthful, a delight to watch: blue and yellow tits, mostly, robins, sparrows (now said to be rare) and a chaffinch or two. Then came trouble.
The first garden terrorist was a squirrel named Randolph because of his blustering manner, also known as Randy or Ran. This creature is young and beautiful, mainly grey with red-brown ears and head, and a streak of red down his back and along his superbly soft, rich and bushy tail, Ran is vigorous, determined and persistent, immensely greedy and quite ruthless in satisfying his appetite. Not content with making use of the cage, intended for birds, not him, or even with pecking at the nuts through the mesh, as they do, he quickly devised a more aggressive approach.
After three days I discovered that he had gnawed through the wood at the bottom of the mesh, using his sharp, pointed teeth, making a slit through which he could get the nuts out whole. Then he would take a nut in both paws and nibble it at his leisure, sitting on his haunches, enjoying the comforts of the balcony. His little almond-shaped eyes glittered with satisfaction at his own ingenuity. Moreover, some of the nuts slipped out through the hole that he had made, and these attracted the attention of a big, clumsy but insatiable woodpigeon — long an enemy of mine. Turn, as he is known, gobbles so much, when opportunity offers, that there are times when he is, quite literally, too heavy to fly. Squirrel and pigeon are not enemies but fellow terrorists, who co-operate together, like al-Oa'eda and the IRA. in wolfing other creatures' food.
I was not having this brutal larceny, So I removed the cage from its nail, threaded its top with tough garden string and suspended it in mid-air from one side of the balcony to the other. Soon both terrorists returned. The pigeon quickly discovered that there were no nuts on the ground, and that he could not peck at them through the mesh as the tits do; his beak being too big and clumsy. So he pushed off. Ran's behaviour was more interesting. First he turned to the nail in the wall and examined it closely to discover why it had lost its burden. Then he examined the fastenings that held the string at both ends. He discovered that he could not walk along the string to his target. Next he found that, stretch up on his hind legs as he might, he could not reach it from the ground. He then spent a long time prowling round all the objects in reach — the vine, the staircase rail, some large terracotta pots containing bulbs — to work out the possibilities of a spring. The care with which he patrolled the entire area, testing the weaknesses of my defensive system — his long pauses for intense scrutiny and silent cogitation, and his sheer determination to solve the problem — were impressive. Here was a thinking squirrel, a worthy opponent for any of Professor Pepperberg's parrots. But meanwhile, beyond his reach, the tits were feasting. That plainly annoyed him: I could see his eyes bulge with frustrated venom. I went to bed that night convinced that I had Ran beaten.
Next morning, early, I realised that I had underestimated his will and cunning. Nuts were everywhere, and he and Tum were enjoying a hearty breakfast. Ran, possibly working in conjunction with Turn (I would not put it past them) had contrived to swing on the string so heavily that they had stretched it and lowered the cage to a point only a foot from the ground. Then Ran had stretched up and gnawed away, creating such a big hole this time that the nuts had poured out. Whenever they wanted more, the two had only to give the cage a bash and the manna flowed. I saw them do it. No sign of the small birds — too frightened of the big boys.
With determined predatory animals, the only answer is to show equal will and persistence. I opened the French windows, scattering the two terrorists into the recesses of the garden, and began a new defence scheme, I got stronger cable. I repaired the cage. I fixed the cable ends higher up, tied them more securely, and stretched the thing absolutely taut, a good four feet above the ground, Then I got back to my armchair, picked up my book — the new, enlarged Poems of Francis Thompson, edited by Brigid Boardman — and waited. Sure enough, Turn was soon back, tried a bit of strong-arm buffeting with his wings, then flew off, baffled; he's not a stupid bird but lacks intellectual stamina. Ran, the squirrel, was more systematic. He went through all his moves of the day before, several times over. He grew increasingly frustrated and angry. He had deduced that I, seen through the glass, was somehow responsible, and he darted at me periodic glances of hate. Finally, he dived into one of the terracotta pots and, in a frenzy, began to scatter the contents. I quickly opened the French windows and drove him away.
That, I realised later, was a mistake. It revealed to Ran that I was attached to the contents of the pots; that they were potential hostages to his fury, and desire. Never let a terrorist know that you really value someone or something. The next morning I learnt the extent of my error. The cage was still hanging high and unviolated — indeed the little birds were enjoying it. But a number of bulbs had been uprooted and scattered about, a dreadful mess. Ran had bitten chunks out of them to show the power of his teeth, and maybe Turn had done damage too. But it was Ran who made his appearance, fixed me with his beady, unfriendly eye, and, in Palmerston's words, said, 'That's my tit for tat with Johnny Russell.' So what am I to do now, Professor Pepperberg? Hell hath no fury like a squirrel starved.
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