[TowerTalk] Nuts to the Squirrels

[Tom McAlee]

Tom - the UV jacket (such as that on Phillystran) supposedly tastes like 
soybean to the squirrels.  Once they get a taste for it they keep coming 
back.

I've never had a problem with polyester though, and I have a squirrel 
over-population problem thanks to a yard and woods full of black walnut 
trees.

73,
Tom, NI1N

----- Original Message ----- 
From: <K5RC at aol.com>
To: <towertalk at contesting.com>
Cc: <PaulKB8N at aol.com>; <Georgek5kg at aol.com>
Sent: Sunday, July 03, 2005 9:57 PM
Subject: [TowerTalk] Nuts to the Squirrels


> Over the last couple of days, two of my wire antennas were found
> mysteriously laying on the ground. The 3/16 Cable Xperts polyester rope 
> had  clearly been
> "chewed" through. The mystery might never have been solved if  it weren't 
> for
> being at one of the tower sites when a gray ground squirrel came  bolting
> down the inside of the tower and ran into the woods with black fabric in 
> its
> mouth. On another tower, I found a winch-load of the rope that had a 
> significant
> amount of the black UV jacket chewed off.
>
> There is plenty of rope coiled on tower bases around the property. What
> would motivate them to climb 40 to 60 feet in the air to chew on the rope? 
> After
> 8 years of absolutely never having a piece of this rope fail, I am curious 
> if
> anyone else has seen their rope being scavenged for nesting materials?
>
> Tom Taormina, K5RC
> Contesting from the Comstock
> W7RN -  K7RC