Most parents fear that one day their child will unexpectedly become a parent. This happened to all of Ms. Mitchell’s Agriculture students. Granted, these parents will be confused and then relieved when they realize that the only baby in their hands is a tiny little squirrel.

Found in her backyard near a dying palm tree, Lara Ibarra, Digital Media teacher, rescued an orphaned grey squirrel.

“The mother was taken by a hawk, along with its siblings,” Ibarra explained, “Me and my husband found it while gardening.” 

Experienced with rehabilitation shelters, she knew the local one near her was too full with other animals, and she wouldn’t be able to feed it the hourly nutrition the baby would need. So, Ibarra reached out to Agriculture teacher, Heather Mitchell, to see if it could be included into the curriculum. Ms. Mitchell decided to take it in, but with a twist: it would be a hands-on experience for her classes. 

The routine is simple: every night one student brings home the furry critter. They’d feed it milk at first and then solid foods such as nuts and berries that have only recently been added to the diet.

“I definitely wanted this to be a student project,” Mitchell said. “This wasn’t something I was going to take on. If they wanted the squirrels– they were going to have to take care of them.”

Discovered to be a female and affectionately named Reeses, like the Peanut Butter snack, she began to be shuffled off night by night, growing bigger and furrier by the day. At her current age of seven weeks, she seems to be almost ready to somewhat reintegrate into nature. 

“When she’s about ten weeks,” Mitchell elaborated, “We’re going to release her into the school patio. She’s very accustomed to people, so I don’t know if she’ll ever [be able to survive] fully on her own, but she will be around.”

As the weeks pass and they prepare to send her out, I would recommend starting to pack a small snack or two. You don’t know when you’ll get a visit from Olympia’s resident student squirrel.