Wild NS squirrels pose for photos around miniature props

HALIFAX – Nancy Rose’s main muses are squirrels.

Her hobby of taking wildlife photos has developed into a small business and the Bedford woman’s work is getting attention around the world.

Most nature photographers want their subjects in wild settings, but not Rose. She wants her squirrels to be a bit more anthropomorphic. The photographer often waits long hours to capture the squirrels in the right moment poking around the miniture props she sets up on her back deck.

But squirrels aren’t always creatures of habit.

“Peanuts!” Rose calls to the squirrels .

“The neighbours probably think I’m crazy. They know I’m nuts, ” she says as she tries to coax a squirrel out of a tree to her deck for more pictures.

Snapping squirrels all started by chance says Rose.

“One day I had a pumpkin out and a squirrel stood on top of it and he had his little paw and the stem of the pumpkin and he just looked like a little pirate on his boat and I thought ‘well that’s kind of cool, maybe I could find him a boat’,” she says.

One photograph has a squirrel wearing a yellow rain hat. “For that one I actually used a thread and I had a back drop and a little stick hanging out and a thread to hold the hat and some peanuts taped up inside the hat. I made the raincoat to go with it.”

Peanuts and peanut butter are regular shopping items.

Rose says peanuts attract the squirrels to many unusual and funny situations. “Hanging the clothes on the line getting a little fresh air, so of course the peanut was clung to a little blanket,” says Rose.

She’s made calendars from her squirrel pictures as gifts and shares her pictures on Flickr.  “All my Flickr friends said ‘ah that’s so cute’, that’s so great and the pictures then tended to show up on a lot of other websites.”

She’s been featured on television in Europe and in the Washington Post and she’s reaping the benefits. “An agency in the U.K. contacted me and wanted to distribute the pictures to U.K. publications,” says Rose who has also been in touch with calender companies.

Rose says after she retires from her job as a high school guidance counselor, she’ll likely turn her hobby into a part-time job.