Wild Wonder story
Hazel's Forgetful Gift
Every autumn, Hazel the squirrel buries hundreds of acorns across Maple Hollow — and forgets where she hid quite a few of them. Follow her from busy autumn digging to a very surprising spring.
A busy autumn morning
Hazel the squirrel scampered across Maple Hollow with her cheeks stuffed full of acorns. Under the crunchy gold leaves, she dug one small hole after another, tucking an acorn into each one. 'Right here, by the mossy rock,' she chattered to herself, patting the dirt smooth. By sundown she had buried three hundred and twelve acorns — she was quite sure of the number, even if she wasn't sure of much else.
A puzzling winter afternoon
When winter came, Hazel dug up acorn after acorn, following the smell of earth and the shapes of roots she remembered. But by a crooked birch stump, she stopped and scratched her ear. 'Was there an acorn here... or over there?' She searched and searched, but a few hiding spots had slipped clean out of her mind, like a dream after waking.
A tiny green surprise
Spring melted the snow, and Hazel hopped back to the crooked birch stump to try one more time. Instead of an acorn, she found something curling up through the dirt: a tiny green sprout no taller than her paw. 'That's not an acorn,' she gasped. 'That's a baby tree!' All around the hollow, more little sprouts were pushing up in the very spots her forgetful memory had missed.
The gardener of Maple Hollow
Hazel's friends gathered to see the new sprouts — Robin the bird, Bramble the rabbit, even old Oakley the elder tree, who rustled his leaves with a chuckle. 'Every forgotten acorn is a wish you didn't know you made,' Oakley told her. 'And look how many wishes are growing now.' Hazel puffed out her chest, prouder of her forgetful memory than she'd ever been of a perfect one. She wasn't just a squirrel who buried acorns anymore — she was a gardener, growing a whole forest one forgotten acorn at a time.