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Squirrel goes nuts for Toyota

SOUTH FLORIDA, Florida - A South Florida family woke up Sunday to find a fist-sized chunk had been taken out of the body of their car.

They feared they’d been the target of vandals and Nora Ziegler said police only deepened that fear when she called them to her home.

But their worries turned to total shock and confusion when the culprit turned out to be a common squirrel.

ENEMY ATTACK?

When Ziegler first saw the 15cm gouge taken straight from the plastic above her wheel well, she called the police.

"They asked me if I had any enemies," the flabbergasted Zeigler told WPTV.

Later that day, the family noticed a second large hole had appeared on the Toyota Sequoia, this one above another wheel.

"We called the police twice," said Zeigler’s daughter Taylor. "They said they had never seen anything like it."

Watch the video

Four other cars, all of them undamaged, lined the driveway near the targeted SUV according to the Daily Mail. "The police told me someone was coming after me,’ Zeigler told WPTV.

CHEEKY MUNCHER

As the worried mom took out the trash around sundown, she caught the culprit bare-pawed. Hanging by its teeth from the hole and gnawing away at the car’s plastic wheel-arch extensions was a cheeky squirrel.

The weird revelation came as a relief for Zeigler, but also a surprise but a local wildlife removal professional was less shocked. Hugh Curran of Absolute Critter Removal told a TV news programme:

"If they're looking to make a nest, chewing for them to find a cavity to make a nest, that's not unusual at all."

So, what are the Zeiglers to do? Nothing, at least for now. Nora Zeigler said she wants to get the holes fixed but is worried the rodent rampage will only continue. "I'm not happy to see my car like this but at least I didn't have any enemies, at least not people," Zeigler said.

While the family plots their move against the squirrel, they’ve fondly nicknamed it Munchy.
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