The story of Oliver - a very friendly orphaned squirrel
Alison Ghanem from Scropton, Derbyshire, first came across the squirrel when he turned up injured in her garden.
She nursed him back to health, named him Oliver, and now he'll snuggle up to her, come when he's called, and even has his own specially designed house.
Here is her story...
I was gardening on the 15th September, when this little squirrel jumped on my boot.
He was so tiny and wet, and when we gave him a biscuit we could see he bleeding a little bit from his mouth.
He must have fallen from his nest, so we looked around, but couldn’t see anything or any other squirrels.
I called two rescue centres who told us that they couldn’t take him, as they hadn’t renewed their licence to have grey squirrels.
So without a blink of an eye, we took control of his well being.
That night we made him a make shift bed in our new fire pit.
We wanted to keep him safe, warm and off the ground outside where he would have become prey to other wildlife. As you can see, his name came from the shoe box he slept in.
He was beyond snug and comfortable.
Oliver's first home
Knowing he’s a wild animal, we wanted to keep him that way, so I went out the next day to buy him a box and feeding station for the garden.
I could only find a blue tit nest box, so set about making the small round hole square and big enough for Oliver to get in and out.
Oliver's second home
A new squirrel box was ordered online that day.
Oliver was very helpful while I was putting his new home bits together.
He slept in his new hut that night.
Oliver's third home
He would eat outside, but being so young, he would still like to come into the house by riding under my jacket, on my back, shoulder, or hip for a warm up and a quick snooze.
Oliver hitches a ride
But when his third den arrived he didn’t want to come in anymore - but can you blame him!
So for the last two months, we have had the pleasure of having Oliver in our garden and in our lives.
It was lovely to see the article regarding Prince Charles and squirrels. They really are a joy to have around.