Squirrel Chess

I live a chess game. My opponent is a hairy gray tree rat (actually, a gang of three or four of them). And every few days each of us makes a move on the birdfeeder chess board. Recent game play has focused on the far end of the feeder tree. Monsieur Rat countered my rearrangement of feeders by figuring out how to shimmy down to a tube way out on the end. I made my next move by swapping in bitter safflower seed. Rat met this challenge by sitting in the seed husk dish and either grawing at the last little bits of sunflower or eating safflower. Last night I countered by getting rid of the dish. (Good grief! Should I allow Rat to have a nice comfortable seat while he raids my feeders? I think not.) Rat is wily and cannot be easily checked. I await my opponent's next move.