His presence in our urban, forested ravine has long been familiar to us. On our daily excursions there, when he follows us to cadge peanuts, it becomes a special occasion. We've grown fond of the little fellow. He is smaller than his peers, a black squirrel sans tail.

We long ago named him Stumpy. And discovered, elsewhere in the ravine another similar to him whom we named Stumpette. We see them both fairly often during the summer months, through into fall and in spring as well. In winter not quite so often, but when we do, we're delighted.

Stumpette isn't as forward as Stumpy, but she too approaches us in expectation that we will deliver peanuts to her personally and we never disappoint. It had been weeks since we last had Stumpy cadge from us, and we wondered, as we've done so often over the years, whether something awry had occurred with him.

Stumpette has a limited range, she doesn't appear too far from a concentrated area where we always see her. Stumpy, on the other hand, roams all over the ravine; we never know where we'll see him, he pops up at the most unexpected places, far from where we've seen him generally.

Just as I was feeling rather concerned a few days back at his continued absence (although we're well aware that he takes advantage of the various cache spots we always leave peanuts in throughout the ravine-trail circuit, knowing full well where they are, unsighted in the process by us), this past week-end, sitting at the breakfast table, I looked up to see him scooting across our back fence.

He obviously has discovered other places besides the ravine where he feels comfortable roaming, checking out prospects.