Tiny (middle distance, left) and Baby (up front) on Chipmunk Patrol at Goomp's this morning before we packed up and headed back home
Shortly after these photos were taken, Tuck called out "The cats have a chipmunk." At first he thought brother and sister were confronting each other but then realized they were working together, closing in for the kill.
The photojournalist in us said "grab the camera," but the Albert Schweitzer in us -- "reverence for life" -- intervened. We rushed outside, where Tiny, in field commander mode, was on the lawn near the terrace observing the scene, Baby having caught the chipmunk and run with it to the newly-mown field below. His mouth was clamped firmly onto its neck. Hunting is his instinct, and saving cute little animals from the jaws is ours, so we grabbed the Babe by the back of his neck the way a mother cat does when she's transporting her kittens, and out popped the prey. It staggered a little but quickly found its legs and scampered off.
With cats and chipmunks, each species knows exactly what to do, but with cats and deer, the predator/prey instinct is skewed by the size differential. We've observed both Tiny and Baby nose-to-nose with White-Tailed Deer, and each seems bemused, the prey too large to worry and the predator too small to go for the jugular.
Speaking of Tiny and Baby, they're over entertaining the folks at Carnival of the Cats.
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