While walking the Riparian Loop Trail in Arbor Hills Nature Preserve this weekend I came to a point where I decided to stop and listen, as I am apt to do. Right away I heard the distinctive crunching and scrapping sounds of a Fox Squirrel gnawing its way through the outer shell of some kind of nut. As I tried to locate the squirrel by following the noises, I quickly became aware that the sounds were actually coming from more than one source. The crunching and scraping noises were all around me. I was literally surrounded by these hungry critters.
The acoustics were strange in this part of the forest, and it was difficult to locate the squirrels among the leaves and branches. When I did finally spot one, it much closer to me than I would have guessed from the sounds it was making.