I had included occasional observations of

chipmunks in my vignette on Wild Crows,

but subsequent experiences with a particular
chipmunk led me to devote an entire
vignette to the subject.

The wall shown at left is located on Ocean

Street, near the west end of White Beach in
Manchester-by-the-Sea. I often lay out food
for the western crows on this wall, so I call it
the feeding wall.

During summer and autumn 2002, a

chipmunk living in this wall used to cuss me
out at length. When I approached and
chirruped, the chipmunk would go inside the
wall, then pop out of a topside hole making
its typical piercing whistle, then disappear
inside the wall again, only to poke its head
out the front and seemingly mimic my chirping, then quick as a wink it would
disappear again, to pop out of another hole making a repetitive chit-chit-chit sound that
puffs out its cheeks. According to some sources, this last sound (chit or chip) is how
the species got its common name. If this be the case, where did the munk part come
from, and what does it mean? Well, according to the ten-pound Random House
dictionary cited in my Bibliography, the word chipmunk is derived from the
Algonquian chitmunk and Ojibwa achitamon, meaning a squirrel that comes headfirst
down tree-trunks. But what squirrel doesn’t come headfirst down tree-trunks? I think
something was lost or added in the translation.

These small ground squirrels are formally

known as eastern chipmunks. They are
found in southeastern Canada and most of
the northeastern United States. The
scientific name for this species is Tamias
striatus. Tamias means “one who stores
things” or sometimes "the treasurer,"
referring to chipmunks’ caching behavior.
Striatus means "striped." (Allen, 1987)

A typical eastern chipmunk is six to eight

inches long, head to tail, and weighs
about three ounces. Its back and sides are reddish-brown, the underside white. It has
two white stripes bordered by black on its sides, one black stripe down the center of
its back, and white strips above and below its eyes. Its tail is reddish brown and furry,
but not bushy like that of common squirrels. Like many rodents, the eastern
chipmunk has four toes on the front feet and five toes on the rear. Its diet includes
nuts, acorns, seeds, mushrooms, fruits, berries, corn, insects, bird eggs, and the
occasional young mouse.

One day while the chipmunk was

directing its chit-chit-chit sound at me,
the crows came along and the
chipmunk, surprisingly enough, took to
the trees. I should think it would have
gone down one of its burrows. In
addition to the safety provided by the
many crevices in the stone wall, into
which a chipmunk can dive at top speed,
even into the narrow ones, the animal
can disappear into one of many ground
burrows, then pop out of another burrow
a few or many feet away. I saw the
chipmunk that resides in the feeding wall
dive into the left hole in the picture
below and pop out of the right one

seconds later. From some distance away

I couldn’t see the holes, so the chipmunk
seemed to disappear, then reappear
several feet away. This all happens so
quickly that you think your eyes are
playing tricks on you.

These holes no doubt connect to other burrows as well as to each other. Chipmunk
burrows can be up to thirty feet long, and have several different exits and tunnels.
Eastern chipmunks conceal the exits with leaves and rocks. They also have burrows
right out in the open, like those in this photograph, into which they can dive should a
predator attack.
These burrows are so neatly made that they look like they were drilled, and so hard-
packed that when I drop a peanut down one, I can hear it slide or roll for some
distance. To make their burrows harder
to spot, the chipmunks remove all

Chip-mumps, you say?

excavated earth in their cheek pouches,

which hold so much that they swell to the
size of the animal’s head. This one has a
double peanut, shell and all, in its left
pouch. One chipmunk was found with
thirty-one kernels of corn in its cheeks. (Nowak, 1991)

As soon as the weather grew cold in 2002, early November, the chipmunks along
Ocean Street dropped out of sight. Yet I continued to see many chipmunks in other
areas as late as 22 November. Throughout the winter, say my sources, eastern
chipmunks stay in their dens. They don't truly hibernate, but do sleep a lot. They may
wake up every few weeks to eat some of the food
they have stored. In good years they cache a
treasure house of food, and build their nests on top
of it.
Biologists say that most chipmunks emerge from their dens in early March, but six
months later, despite my daily feeding of peanuts and other goodies to the western
crows on the feeding wall, I had seen no sign of the resident chipmunk. In fact, as of
early May I had yet to see or hear my first chipmunk in the entire area. The resident
chipmunk’s burrow entrances were clear of leaves and twigs, so they appeared to be
in use. I tried tempting the chipmunk out with some roasted peanuts, but to no avail,
so I dropped a peanut into each of several burrows. From that day on, while taking my
daily walks, I left a few peanuts in each of the three major stone walls along that
section of Ocean Street. This had no effect on the chipmunk residing in the feeding
wall; when it finally put in an appearance, it was still cussing me out.

Summer passed and about mid-August the chipmunk in the feeding wall began to
show signs of softening toward me. One day this chipmunk was running back and
forth between its wall and the one across the street, gathering food from the woods
over there and bringing it back here. In the course of this, it was passing within a few
feet of me and going under my car both ways, probably to minimize its exposure to
airborne predators.

The next day the chipmunk passed within a few feet of me to take the peanuts I had
left atop the wall. After caching those nuts, it returned to the wall, sat up on its hind
legs, and watched me. I chirruped to it, and it seemed to like the sound. It jumped
down onto the lawn and approached me. I broke out my camera and photographed
the chipmunk, luring it with peanuts. I also placed a fresh dinner roll (see the
photograph at right) on the grass, but the chipmunk preferred peanuts. Within an hour
I all but had it eating out of my hand, and I think it would have done so, were it not so
frequently spooked by passing traffic, and by a woman who was watching us from a
car parked nearby. I had the chipmunk
coming so close that at one point I had
the camera lens on the macro setting.
All this time the crows (already fed) were perched overhead, watching and making
the occasional corvine comment. It occurred to me that crows probably prey on
chipmunks. I began to wonder whether the crows might become envious and attack
the chipmunk, but I think that would
have been preceded by a lot of
aggressive vocalization. On the contrary,
I heard only muttering, and not once did
any of the crows try to steal the
chipmunk's peanuts, though the nuts
were at times six feet or more away from
me, about the critical distance for the
crows. On the other hand, when I put
some peanuts on the wall for the crows,
the chipmunk stole one right out from
under a crow's nose, and gave the crow
hell when it tried to take back the
peanut. And would you believe, the
crow backed off! That crow was
probably a juvenile. I suspect that
chipmunks and squirrels know which crows are juveniles, and know they can be
bullied. Anyway, I guess that answers my question of whether chipmunks regard
crows as predators.

(20 August 2003) Again a western juvenile crow was perched in the big tree by the
feeding wall, talking to itself with a wide
variety of sounds, then the bird fell silent
when it saw me feeding peanuts to a
chipmunk. Surprised by the sudden
silence, I looked up and saw the young
crow watching me intently. Two others
joined it, and all three watched the scene
unfolding below them. This chipmunk (I
assume it’s the same one that came to
me yesterday) is approaching within a
foot of me now. It rolls each unshelled
peanut around in its mouth, as if licking it
clean, then tucks it into one of its cheek
pouches and carries it to its cache. It
doesn’t wet the peanut when eating it
right away, only before slipping it into a
cheek pouch, so the wetting may relate to
the nature of the pouch, which is said to
be hairless inside but not moist.
When the chipmunk eats peanuts on the spot, it doesn’t always simply bite through
the shell as a gray squirrel would. On occasion it turns the peanut over and over, as
though on a lathe, gradually thinning the shell wall until its teeth break through.
Perhaps some shells are too thick to bite through directly.

This chipmunk now follows me around like a puppy dog, cute as can be. It's here
beside the car now, sitting up on its hind legs and watching me as I write this on the
trunk lid. Ah, peanut power.

By the way, chipmunks make an

impressive variety of sounds, many of
them quite musical and birdlike.

I fear I may lead the chipmunk into

harm's way. I was sitting on a beach rock

a hundred feet from the chipmunk’s wall, and

who should pop out of the brush right beside
me but my chipmunk friend. (I’m tired of
referring to this chipmunk as “it,” and seeing
no sign of a scrotum, I’ll assume that it’s a
female.) I worry about her being killed by a cat or fox, but then again, she was running
back and forth across Ocean Street long before she befriended me. (On that subject,
this chipmunk often enters the territory across the street, but when the chipmunk from
across the street comes over to this one's wall, she chases it. They don’t appear to
fight, at least not viciously. I suspect a lot of this is mating behavior.) If this chipmunk
is female, she might have a litter in the burrow. What fun it would be if they too
accepted me.

Correction. The chipmunk sat up on its hind legs for some time, and I saw what looks
like a penile opening, located halfway down its abdomen. A female would have no
opening there; anal and genital openings would be back under the root of her tail. She
is a he.

(22 August 2003) I have him eating out of my hand! What fun! I touched a humpback
whale years ago (it placed one flipper on the gunwale of the boat), and it was
tremendously exciting to be accepted by a creature large enough to crush me like a
bug. But this is just as exciting in the reverse sense, for here is a tiny creature
extending trust to a human who outweighs it by 880:1, about twice as much as the
humpback whale outweighed me.

Before taking food from me, the chipmunk runs this way and that several times. After
stuffing a peanut into one of his cheek pouches, he smells my hand and examines it to
see whether I have another peanut hidden there. If not, he scampers uphill to cache
the nut. Some peanuts he eats right in front of me.

This chipmunk is fearless. Using my digital camera, I tried to photograph him eating
from my hand, but the shutter delay (characteristic of digital cameras) left me with
photographs of him having already taken the peanut and sitting some inches away. So
I tried holding on tightly to the peanut until the shutter opened. The little rascal
grabbed the peanut in his jaws, and when I didn’t release it right away, he pushed
against my hand with one forepaw. He’s surprisingly strong for his size. Now, every
time he takes food from me, he taps my hand with a forepaw, as if reminding me to
release my grip. [I have since learned how to avoid shutter delay by depressing the
shutter release button halfway before setting up a shot like this, or an action shot.]
 W hat’s this?

Mmm, peanut butter.

He never makes a sound when we're interacting. And unlike the crows, he largely
ignores my cameras. He even let me walk up to him, carrying a large old (1980) tape
recorder (my newer ones are inoperative and missing), and let me thrust a
microphone into his face. How about a few words for the folks? Not a sound. Finding
the microphone inedible, he scurried off to see whether the crows had left any scraps
on the feeding wall.

I know the crows have seen all my interactions with the chipmunk (they're forever
watching me), and this may be increasing their trust. While I was putting leftover
breakfast toast on the feeding wall, one crow landed only six feet away from me to
eat.
(25 August 2003) When I parked at White Beach this morning, I heard a birdlike chit-
chit call coming from the ocean end of a thick clump of brush that extends from the
feeding wall some sixty feet onto the beach. I chirruped, and the chipmunk came
bounding along the sand to me. Clearly he can identify me by sight, but he was calling
even as I got out of the car. He seems to recognize my car as well as me, perhaps
visually, perhaps by the sound of its engine. When I first drive up, I often see him
running back and forth along the wall, pausing to look at the car, perhaps seeing me
through the windows.

My interaction with this chipmunk has attracted attention from other chipmunks. I
find that the feeding wall is inhabited by at least three of them, #1 at the ocean end,
Spunky (the one eating from my hand, named after my late cat) in the center, and #3
at the other end. #1 has been observing the hand-feeding, and shows interest. It
clearly wants to come to me, but is skittish. I believe this is the one that used to scold
me. It seems to share at least one burrow with Spunky, just behind the feeding wall.
They have also shared the peanut-butter lick at that burrow’s entrance, but #1 often
chases Spunky back to his part of the wall.

There’s also a lot of coming and going between the feeding wall and the stone wall
across the street. For some reason I see at least three chipmunks living in the feeding
wall, and seldom see any in the wall across the street. I put peanuts in a niche in that
wall, and they always disappear, but on one occasion I saw a chipmunk from the
feeding wall cross the street to get the peanuts I left. I’m sure chipmunks live in the
wall across the street, but only once have I seen one there, and that was last year. It
came within a few feet of me, then beat a hasty retreat.

According to a source that seems reliable, too many peanuts can swell inside a
chipmunk, presumably causing blockages, so I’ve cut down on peanuts for Spunky
and added sunflower seeds, which he literally vacuums into his pouches. I also
include grapes and any other fruit I can get at reduced prices. When presented with
his first grape, presumably the first he’d ever seen, Spunky ate it on the spot. Since
then, though, he often leaves the grape behind. Apparently if he’s too full, or not in the
mood to eat a grape on the spot, he’ll leave it rather than cache it because he knows it
will rot.
This chipmunk seems most active at the beginning and end of each day. Often, when
I visit White Beach about mid-day, he’s nowhere to be seen, and no amount of
chirruping on my part will produce him. I take it he’s in his nest chamber, enjoying a
siesta.

Spunky definitely shares burrows with

#1. Today (2 September 2003) they were
running back and forth atop the wall and
in the grass, both passing so close to me
that I couldn’t tell them apart. I had
brought raisins, thinking Spunky would
love them, but he turned his nose up at
them. That is, until I put out raisins for
the crows at the ocean end of the feeding
wall, whereupon Spunky scampered over
there and stole every one. He came
away with his cheeks bulging so much
that you’d think he had an unshelled
walnut inside each pouch. There had to
have been at least thirty raisins on that
wall. Now he takes whatever raisins I
give him.

His first loves are peanuts and peanut

butter, but out of concern for his health,
I’m rationing his peanut intake. He
caches most of the sunflower seeds I put
Love those sunflower seeds
out for him. He’s exceedingly gentle. I
can hold twenty or thirty sunflower
seeds, with my hand flattened against the top of the wall or on the grass, and he’ll take
every last one into his pouches, even those seeds wedged between my fingers,
without laying a tooth on me. He does this with both forepaws resting on my hand.

Spunky is becoming very aggressive about getting handouts. I was away from the
wall, photographing a red-tailed hawk, and Spunky was raising Cain, repeatedly
sounding his alarm whistle. I went over there to see what was wrong, and there he
was atop the stone wall, running back and forth, then sitting up as though begging like
a dog. I returned to my photography, but Spunky would not be ignored. With a sharp
whistle he jumped down off the wall, ran under my car, and right up to my foot. He
looked up at my face, then turned and raced back to the wall. I think I have a spoiled
chipmunk on my hands.

(3 September 2003) I wanted to get a close-up of Spunky rearing up on his hind legs,
so I held a peanut high above the wall, too high for him to reach, and looked through
the viewfinder of my camera. I felt something strike my hand, and the peanut fell into
the grass. The chipmunk had leaped and tried to take the peanut with his paws. I
tried again, but instead of standing up, he kept leaping and trying to grab the peanut.
Twice he fell off the wall and onto the lawn. After five attempts, I gave up the effort
and let him have the peanut, but I think I had angered him. The next few times I
offered him a peanut by hand, he seized it with a lightning-fast movement of his front
paws. I could feel his sharp little claws graze my skin. He’s settled down now,
though, and takes peanuts gently, sometimes with his paws, sometimes with his
mouth. On the whole, he’s quite gentle. On one occasion, he mistook one of my
fingers for a peanut and gave it an exploratory nip, but came nowhere near breaking
the skin.

While I was so engaged at the feeding wall, I saw #1 go over to my car and rear up on
its hind legs to look at the partly open trunk. It knows very well where the goodies are
kept.

Later, I was at the car, typing notes on the trunk lid. For some reason I turned and saw
a freshly killed chipmunk lying on the road a few feet from the side where Spunky
lives. My heart sank. The first words out of my mouth were, “Oh no, not you.” I
thought for certain it was Spunky, but he came when I called. Thank God. I’ve really
come to love this little rascal. I gave him some extra goodies.

I think the dead chipmunk was from the wall across the street. It had been run over
by a car. Death must have been instantaneous. I hid its body behind the stone wall
from which I think it came, out of sight of the crows. I’d rather they didn’t develop a
taste for chipmunk, dead or alive. Next morning, the body was gone.

While taking my daily walk today (5 September 2003), I saw Spunky follow me almost
to the end of the 300-foot feeding wall, then dive into a burrow next to the top of the
wall when a jogger passed. He and another chipmunk came out of another burrow
near the bottom of the wall, exchanged playful nips, and went their separate ways.
This leads me to believe that this stone wall is the frontal limit of a single chipmunk
community whose burrows extend well uphill. In the area where Spunky spends most
of his time, there is another, cruder stone wall some ten above the feeding wall,
covered by thick shrubbery. But I believe that wall is the territory of another
chipmunk, for Spunky takes his food to be cached higher up the hill and to the right of
this second wall. The chipmunks in these walls may be an extended family. As best I
can tell, they number at least six. Exogamous breeding opportunities probably exist in
the wall right across the street.

I decided to give Spunky the mirror-test of self-awareness. (See details on this subject
in my vignette, “Flocks of Crows – a Journal.”) I am so impressed with this
chipmunk; he is totally without fear. Despite a foot-square mirror tile looming over his
wall, he scampered over as soon as I chirruped, picked up the peanut and posed for
animal crackers, as my mother use to say. He remained in front of the mirror until he
had finished washing the peanut, then took it to his storehouse. Of course, this
doesn’t prove that he’s self-
aware -- I saw no reaction to
his image – but at least he
didn’t mistake his reflection
for another chipmunk. Had
he done so, I’m sure he
would have reacted, perhaps
violently (nobody touches
Spunky’s peanuts!), when his
reflection reached for the
same peanut.

As the weather cools, a

chipmunk is more and more
driven to fill its storehouse
with food. Spunky will carry
off every bit of storable food
that I give him (fresh fruit,
Devilishly handsome, I must say. peanut butter, etc. are eaten
on the spot), then run to the
feeding wall and take
sunflower seeds and raisins left for the crows. The gray squirrels love these, too, and
Spunky can often be seen just inches from the much larger squirrels, snatching food
right out from under their noses. Turnabout is fair play, though, for they’re forever
eating the peanut butter I put out for Spunky. I have never seen Spunky eat bread, but
I’ve seen some of the other chipmunks in the wall do so.

(27 September 2003) I haven’t seen Spunky since mid-September, and I’m worried.
Because of a detour, which lasted about a week, traffic along Ocean Street was many
times heavier than normal. Now and then I see chipmunks, in the same wall, but they
won’t come to me. I can only hope that Spunky built up such a treasure trove of treats
that he opted for early retirement.

(11 October 2003) I see many chipmunks near the entrance to Ravenswood Park in
Magnolia, while most chipmunk burrows in the Ocean Street walls are already choked
with leaves.

(29 May 2004) I saw my first chipmunk on Ocean Street since they dropped out of sight
last November. It appears to be Spunky. He appears not to recall our past interactions
well enough to trust me, but he is much more curious about me than other chipmunks
were last year, and much more willing to tolerate fairly close approaches without
ducking out of sight. Also, he responds to my chirrups.

When I first saw him, he sat up atop the wall and watched as I walked to the car about
100 feet away to get some peanuts. When I returned, he was in the same spot,
watching me. I showed him a peanut, then laid it on the wall. He ducked out of sight,
then reappeared near the peanut, and took it down a burrow. When he did not
reappear for some time, I laid another peanut on the wall and took my walk. When I
returned, the peanut was still there. I chirruped. He came out and I showed him the
peanut. When I later returned, the peanut was gone.

I think he vaguely remembers me, but I believe that a six-month hibernation affects his
memory.

Gradually he became bolder, running along the wall toward me as I approached, but
about two weeks passed before he accepted food from my hand. Then he became
quite bold, leaning out over the wall as I approached, and snatching each peanut from
my hand with both forepaws. On the other hand, at times he'll duck down inside the
wall as I approach, and accept peanuts only while in the safe confines of one of his
favorite porticoes, taking the treat tentatively in his mouth, without use of forepaws.
This may be another chipmunk sharing Spunky's territory, either a sibling or a mate.

(6 August 2004) I now have a gray squirrel eating out of my hand. Spunky must resent
the competition, for when he sees the gray squirrel cat-walking my way, he puts on a
burst of speed and takes the peanut I'm holding out for the gray. The gray approaches
me very slowly, and takes each peanut very gently. Of the four or five gray squirrels
enjoying my hand-outs, all of them well aware of Spunky eating from my hand, this is
the only gray that has been approaching within a few feet of me over the last several
days, and is now taking peanuts from my hand. This squirrel often approaches me
while I'm walking back and forth in the shade. When it sees me approaching, it
climbs down a tree onto the roadway and hops in my direction. Its hopping is a bit
tentative, as though it’s wondering whether it has the right human. When I drop to
one knee and hold out a peanut, the squirrel approaches catlike and very gently takes
the peanut in its mouth. Unlike the chipmunks, who often scratch my hands with their
sharp claws, the gray squirrels never take food from me with their paws. And I’ve
never felt a squirrel tooth, while I’ve been nipped repeatedly by chipmunks trying to
determine which of my fingers is the peanut. In my “Flocks of Crows” vignette, I gave
gray squirrels high marks for self-awareness and smartness. Let’s give them another
one for courtesy and gentleness.

By the end of autumn 2004 I had two chipmunks and two gray squirrels eating out of
my hand.
Over that winter I concluded that I had been modifying their behavior to a degree that
might endanger the animals, so I decided to stop feeding them. As it turned out, the
crows came to be included in this change, because a painful case of chilblains forced
me to start taking my daily walks inside one of the local shopping malls. Seldom have
I walked on Ocean Street this winter, but the crows (only three survivors now) still
remember me and follow me for
hand-outs. I give them what I
have left in the trunk of my car,
oyster crackers mostly. When
those are gone, I intend to stop
feeding the crows.

That about wraps up this vignette. If

anything interesting happens, I’ll
update the web site.

Th-th-that’s all, folks.