The new Vetranian Botanical Gardens have suffered a massive blow: a massive infestation of squirrels. After weeks of capital expenditures to improve the botanical gardens, construction has yielded us with this absolute disaster to the public purse. Not only that, weeks of construction on these public grounds have resulted in numerous injuries to both visitors and contractors, overextended budgets, and a whole lot of squirrels.
Entering the botanical gardens, one is met with a pungent smell that wafts throughout the entire front section. Water spurts out of pipes that have been, seemingly, dug up. As one grounds keeper puts it: “Ay, the squrriels ‘ave properly taken over this park. They’ve shittin’ all over the beds ‘n digging up the pipes. These here are the northern Griffin squrriels, so they ‘ave a taste for copper. They’ve been chewing through the pipes once they dig them up… it’s a damn nightmare. I remove squirrel nests and see sticky notes sayin’ I should be cleaning the loo frum 10-11am. Miserable.”
The casualty total stands at seven contractors and four civilians injured. No deaths have been reported, though one woman has been bitten by a squirrel. One child was seen taken away by the squirrels and pronounced “bagged”.
We managed to speak with the Manager for Scheduling of the botanical gardens over Zoom. Of the many issues they were facing, the manager, “Gerg” [sic!], remarked that both software and fauna were making efforts tricky. “The bloody Duke’s senior team forgot to subscribe to the scheduling software, unfortunately. I’ve been trying my best to provide the staffing schedule with sticky notes, but as you can expect, the squirrels have been taking those for their nests. I currently have staff beautifying the Mehrian garden section and others five miles away lost in the Eastern forests. Without the software, I don’t expect two-thirds of them to return.”
The Pavia Daily will continue to monitor the situation as it develops. We do not expect to see meaningful solutions for the next few weeks as teams of Pavian Coastguard soldiers work to wipe out the squirrel nests. Since Pavia has a sizable furry population in the main city, we know this will be a tricky civil situation indeed.
