Trying to save a squirrel didn't go so well

The squirrel we found

In August last year, when I had our dog, Asuna, out running around the yard, she found something interesting. Now, normally, she would chase a squirrel and when they would inevitably climb a tree to escape, she would leap as if she could just fly up and pluck it from the branch it was taunting her from. But in this case, she was hesitant. She sniffed it and looked a little worried. I don't know if it was because it was so still or if it smelled like it was in trouble. She let me check it out without worrying that I might take it away. But I thought I'd just leave it there because I'd heard that the mother would come back and get it. But then I noticed a bunch of ants around it and it was twitching and I thought maybe they were biting at it and it was reacting. I couldn't allow that. So, I picked it up and got all the ants off it. I put it up in the crook of the tree so its mother could find it but then had second thoughts.

I ended up putting it in a small box with some cloth and got some milk and dabbed it around it's mouth. It licked it and I could see it swallow so my wife found a dropper we would have used to give the kids some liquid medicine and fed it milk through that. I had to go very slowly until it realized that the milk was availabe and then I could see it licking and swallowing. I gave it milk until it stopped swallowing and put it back in the box. I did that every hour or so until bedtime. I didn't know where to put it to keep our pets from bothering it so I put it in our unheated garage. I made the decision to not get up in the middle of the night to feed it and just left it alone. I figured if it wasn't alive in the morning, that would tell me that it was beyond help.

Well, the next morning, it had burrowed under the cloth and was still moving when I touched it so I started giving it milk again. My wife had a doctor's appointment that day and I drove her there and then stayed out in the car feeding the squirrel while I waited. That's when she took the picture you see above. This continued through the day and then I thought it was better that I take to the Cape Wildlife Center so my son drove me there while I took care of our little friend. When we got there, it was raining like last time but no tornadoes this time. We had to wait in line behind a number of other rescues. When our turn came, we gave them the information and a donation and they gave us a card with a reference number and a phone number to check on the progress of the little squirrel.

When we got home, Asuna sniffed and sniffed me and seemed to wonder what I'd done with her new friend. I had been letting her see it when I fed it and she was very careful. I think see missed it already - just as I did. I kind of wished I had kept it here a little longer but I figured the Wildlife Center would have better facilities and the right food for it. I had a hard time waiting for a full day to call for a status check. When I did, I got bad news that the little squirrel didn't make it. That's all the information they had. Then the guilt hit me. "I could have done that well myself," I thought. "They were probably too busy to take proper care." "Why didn't they just refuse to take it if they were not going to save it?"

It's death hit me a lot harder than I thought it would. When something has depended on you and you take the time to help it, it does hurt if things don't work out. And that was just part of two days for me. I felt like I had let the little squirrel down. I'll tell you one thing - if Asuna ever finds another baby squirrel, I'm going to take care of it myself. I'm gathering up the information I need and looking for the supplies I need to keep in stock.