How a Stanford squirrel broke into my dorm room and stole my nuts

Stanford college students are a notable magnet for unusual animal encounters. Everybody has or is aware of somebody who has had an unbelievable run-in with the third form, together with Sierra Knudsen ’22.

Knudsen was a sufferer of Grand Theft Path Combine within the fall of 2019. As a resident assistant (RA) in Muwekma-Tah-Ruk, she moved in early to her first-floor room for workers coaching. When she left for her employees retreat, she propped open the floor-to-ceiling home windows. 

When Knudsen returned, she seen one thing was amiss. “It may need been like a number of hours into being again, however I noticed all of my meals was, like, in every single place.”

Strewn throughout her desk and the bottom had been snacks like peanuts, almonds and Reese’s Items.

“I used to be like, ‘Did somebody come into my room? And it is a prank?’” Knudsen stated. Finally, she seen a gap within the window’s mesh display screen. “It was simply so weird. I used to be actually confused.” In line with her, there was not even a “starter gap” for the creature to chew away at. “It was undoubtedly a recent gap,” Knudsen stated.

Given Knudsen’s affinity for raccoons, she likes to “faux that it was a raccoon that was simply shacking up in my room for the weekend.” Sadly, she thinks the opening’s smaller measurement is extra indicative of the intruder being a squirrel.

“I used to be simply so upset too as a result of, you already know, nuts are form of costly,” she stated.

Knudsen estimated there to be $50 value of snacks that had been misplaced or broken. 

I advised Knudsen about an RA who had a raccoon break into his room. “I’d have cherished it if that had occurred to me,” she stated.

Courtesy of Sarayu Pai

Asa Mittal ’27 additionally had an animal steal his meals, however throughout a childhood go to to Bengal, visiting a relative that lived on the outskirts of Kolkata. 

In line with Mittal, he was sitting outdoors consuming a snack and “minding [his] personal enterprise.” In the meantime, a peckish monkey should have crept up on him, as a result of swiftly, he was a sufferer of Grand Theft Samosa. 

As he chatted with somebody, he was not being attentive to his snack. “I felt the samosa being snatched from my hand and I turned and noticed this monkey operating away with my samosa,” Mittal recounted.

Mittal was probably not against the entire ordeal though “it was barely regarding that [the monkey] obtained so near [him] and [he] had no clue.” 

“I used to be six, so it was fairly cool to have an animal steal my meals,” Mittal stated. 

Raccoons do appear to rule the roost at Stanford. A pair weeks in the past, I used to be floored to see a pack of 4 chubby raccoons congregating close to Mayfield Avenue in broad daylight. They appeared to be plotting one thing as they scurried round, their bushy tails swaying. Final January, I used to be retrieving my automobile from the Manzanita Storage after I noticed a pair of raccoons additionally fiddling across the pavement. I ought to have minded my very own enterprise then, however as a substitute, I began to document them, impressed by their wholesome measurement. 

Hastily, one screamed on the different and swatted the opposite along with his paw. For sure, I wasn’t eager on being caught within the furry fray so I ran for my life. 

The raccoons will not be alone of their campus mischief. Kelsey Wang ’23 had an encounter final fall with an acrobatic squirrel that appeared to have been plucked straight out of a Looney Tunes cartoon. In line with Wang, she was “peacefully biking by means of Principal Quad” at roughly 2:13 PM, when, abruptly, a large “ashy brown” squirrel scampered into her path. 

In line with Wang, “the squirrel t-boned my entrance bike wheel, obtained entangled within the spokes for 4 seconds, after which lastly escaped by leaping, I need to say, 6 ft within the air.” 

With its short-lived profession as an Olympic excessive jumper, the squirrel fled the scene apparently unscathed. Sadly, Wang most undoubtedly didn’t.

Though the incident left her “terrified,” Wang wished nothing however one of the best for the squirrel’s wellbeing. “Within the second, all I may really feel was shock … It was a sense of pure shock and confusion,” she stated.

This sequence started in response to a pitch to grasp why animals at Stanford appear larger than normal. I rapidly discovered that many college students had some zany story to inform. These days, only a few those who I meet have been spared the query, “have you ever had a bizarre animal encounter?” It actually makes me joyful to see that animal encounters have turn into a Stanford ceremony of passage.