Squirrels

Last Wednesday while mowing the lawn, I found a dead gray squirrel in the yard. This was a first. I've seen plenty that were killed by automobiles while crossing the street but I've never found one lifeless in the yard before.

Amazingly, two days later I was looking out a bedroom window and saw another dead gray squirrel. I thought it might have been the first dragged to a new position by a scavenger, but I was wrong. The first was where I had left it, I soon discovered, and now there was a second.

Both were in the vicinity of a decaying stump that had a number of mushrooms and other organisms feasting on its weakened wood. I suppose it's possible the squirrels poisoned themselves by sampling something they shouldn't have.

Or, maybe it was some disease. Strange.