Man Uses Kids’ Toy on The Bird Feeder Pole to Ward off Squirrels — It Went Better Than Expected

Feeding birds is a spiritual practice. However, the moment you create a pristine setup for the birds to feed, you also send an unintended invitation to the troops of hungry rodents prowling in the neighbourhood. We’re talking about squirrels. Though cute, these rodents carry a reputation for being invasive and aggressive that not only destroys the feeder but also instills terror in the innocent birds, according to a study published in Landscape & Urban Planning. Thankfully, a British man, who goes by u/stateit on Reddit, shared a video showing how a simple object, a kid’s slinky spring toy, drove away a squirrel thief in his garden.

The clip opens into his garden lawn, where a feeder is dangling from the branch of a slim-barked tree. The trunk is enwrapped in a silver coil-like slinky toy, which is springing up and down with the rhythm of the day breeze. Soon, this fuzzy brown-grey squirrel enters the scene and tries to climb the tree to reach the bird food. But as it latches onto the spring, the slippery gravity makes the squirrel fall. Undeterred, the squirrel makes another attempt. It tries to climb the tree, but again, ends up slipping down on the green lawn. The buttinsky tries again and again, but each time, the springy toy pushes it downwards, ultimately thwarting its every attempt.

Shocked and eventually discouraged by the slinky trap, the squirrel leaps across the lawn and hops on the garden staircase to take a look at the owner, who, probably, is grinning at its failure. Perched on a stair, the squirrel bobs its head, eyeballing someone towards the camera, looking dead in the eye, as if saying that it’ll return for revenge. But as for this moment, the problem was solved. The man had conquered the interloper. “Result! Furry nut goblin vanquished,” the Reddit user wrote in the post. “The amount of £££s of bird seed this nut-munching tree rat has eaten. Beaten by a slinky.”

Thousands of viewers found the video funny, but most of them were skeptical that this “slinky toy trap” would work in the long run. They said this is just "for the moment," the squirrel will eventually figure out another way to reach the feeder. Many joked that the man had already turned this squirrel into a mortal enemy, and it will now return with pliers, chainsaws, or wire cutters, probably drunk on beer. “By the end of the week, he will have taken a sip of Carling Black Label, and you will be walking out on the lawn waving a white flag,” said u/hydrocotyle99.

u/immediate-yak2249 predicted: “You've won the battle, but will lose the war.” Others made scenarios of how this squirrel, motivated by failure, would charge back stronger, and the birder should always keep an eye open and be ready for an attack. “I would sleep with one eye open, that thing will be coming for revenge,” cautioned u/ohdontshootimgay.  

Less than 24 hours had gone by, and the vengeful squirrel returned, just as all these Reddit users had foreseen. The man’s wife woke him up and showed him a photo in her phone in which the same squirrel was sitting on their feeder, snacking on sunflower seeds. “Woken by a phone being proffered to my eyes showing a picture of a grey fluffball up the birdfeeder scoffing sunflower seeds out of a bird feeder,” he shared.