PeanutPumpkin,The Southern Flying Squirrel

On Aug 28, 2006, my 15 year old headed out for his morning run. He found this ugly little pink thing, about half as long as my thumb, on the street under the big oak tree. Turns out, he is a Southern Flying Squirrel. Taking care of him has been a blast! He is soooo funny to me. Its unbelieveable how he can cheer up each and every person in this family, just by watching him. He is still such a baby and I will be absolutely broken-hearted when he gets ready to go back to the 'wild'. (its hard for me to call my backyard "The Wild".) I have done a lot of searching for info, especially when I first found him. Here is the most helpful site that I found. www.squirreltales.org. I spoke with the the siteowner over email, and she quickly pointed out the things that I was not doing right, a little itimidating but she is very knowledgeable. And thanks to her website, he is alive and very well. (some minor adjustments have to be made for the flying squirrel.. they are a great deal smaller than the gray squirrel.) He is so very adorable. I am trying to pull the video clips from my phone but having trouble.... i will post those later. The kids named him Peanut, but since I call everyone, by habit, punkin, he answers to Punkin (not pumpkin, i am southern to the core) . I didn't even know that we have flying squirrels in my neighborhood.. they are nocturnal, and i had never seen one. I think he was less than a week old when we got him. He was pink, eyes closed, ears closed and ugly... and very very tiny. the first pics are maybe a couple of weeks later. I really didn't think that I could get him thru the first week, even told the kids that he probably wouldn't make it because he was just too young and really needed his mom. But, here we are, November and he is here, healthy, cute and spoiled rotten. I wish that I could find someone else who has one in their care to compare notes. I followed the raise and release advise on the aformentioned website, but he is just still not ready. (I know, you probably think that I am the one not ready, and I will not argue that point. It's true.) But he isn't either. He just took his first flying leap from my shoulder to the back of the couch 3 weeks ago. He still can't open nuts by himself, excluding peanuts. He still calls me when I get out of site, and he still has not rejected his formula! He is taking it fewer times a day, and drinking less at a time.) If you are reading this and have some knowledge to pass onto me, that would be great... If you have just found yourself with one in your care and have any questions, I will be happy to share what I know. from formula prep to this strange facination he has with "grooming my eyebrows" and his obsession with my fingernails, he is really really a lot of fun.