From the Chipper's Point of View

Chip! Hello there and welcome to my world. My relatives and I live in the Garden of Eatin', although the tall two-legged creatures who share our world like to pretend it is their backyard.  Sure it is....  We keep them around as gardeners, but chipmunks are the dominant life species here. Chip!

We chipmunks are energetic beings, always on the hunt for something good to eat, and we eat many different things such as peanuts, insects, different types of grains, the eggs of certain birds, various types of fungi and even worms as well. Sometimes chipmunks also love bird seeds, dried or even fresh bananas, apples, peas, tomatoes, grapes, sweet corn, grass, cucumber, dried apricots, sunflower seeds etc. My gardeners have strict orders to keep sunflower seeds out for us all the time. They put them in bird feeders we can't reach, but it's OK.  The birds are glad to toss some to the ground to share with us. Sometimes we climb up on the sunflower plants and help ourselves to the seeds. Yummy! They are always better when they are fresh! When autumn comes, we stuff them in our cheek pouches to stash away in underground storage bins for the winter.

We share our Garden of Eatin' with the neighbors, and we all get along pretty well.  The squirrel tribe keeps to the trees for the most part, coming down to share the bounty of sunflower seeds. We invite the squirrels to our fence races sometimes, but they don't want to participate.  The wooden fence around our Garden makes a great race track for us speedy chipmunks.

We chipmunks are intelligent creatures, and our spiritual needs are met by Brother Brown, a Chip Monk.  We tithe our seeds to the Church of Chiptymonk, and he prays for us.  Like other idyllic places, we have to watch constantly for the evil Cat demon. The Cat demon hides and spies on us.  Sometimes our teenage chipmunks dare each other to taunt this demon, calling him names.  This enrages the evil Cat, and when it gets loose in our Garden, none of us are safe. I've heard tales about rash chipmunks who have been captured by the Cat demon.  But they kept their wits about them, and when the Cat started to torture them, they were able to escape.  I love listening to tales of great heroes and their mighty deeds during the cold winter nights.

The Raging Torrent is both a blessing and a curse in the Garden of Eatin'.  The steep rock cliffs make it risky to climb down to the life-giving water for a drink on a hot summer day.  We have to be careful or we will be swept away by the rapids.

Our Garden has a variety of habitats.  We can dart into the forests and jungles if we need to hide or just cool off.  There are brush piles and rock condos that some of us like.  I prefer my hole under the flower bed wall.  Did you know that there are more of my relatives living in a human cemetery than there are humans buried there? Yes, it's true!

Another of my favorite spots is the giant flowers. They smell good and are tasty too. The tall grasslands are easy to cross while traveling from one side of our world to the other.  I understand that there are other worlds like mine all over, but I'm sure this Garden of Eatin' is the best. I doubt those chipmunk tribes even speak the same language I do, so I'm happy to stay home. 

Chip! Chip! Chip!  Well, that's my mother calling me home for dinner.  I'll see you later!