Varmits

Varmints or is it “Varmits”? I can never remember.

I remember the summer when I was about sixteen and we had a chipmunk that was living in the drain under the garage. My Dad handed me a handgun (which I held by the trigger area like a dirty sock – you know, “girl style”) and told me to point it at the hole in the stone wall. He said that he was going to flush the rodent out and that when I saw it, I should shoot it. Riiiight. I let him go back into the garage to do his “flushing” and as soon as the thing ran out, I shrieked, shot the gun into the air and yelled for the chipmunk to “Run away and be free!!” Obviously, I forgot that there would be no chipmunk carcass as proof of the killing, but whatever!! Girls don’t shoot chipmunks. At least not this girl.

Joe and I had a bat “situation” a few years ago too. Just thinking about those stupid bats (yea, yea, I know they’re good for the environment…) still gives me the heebie jeebies!! It went like this. Joe was out of town (of course) and I woke up at 3:00AM to the sounds of flapping. I saw the bat get hit by the ceiling fan and I quickly pulled the covers over my head. The crazy thing landed on my face!! (Well, on top of the covers on top of my face but close enough.) I flipped the covers over and started piling pillows on top of it while the nasty thing shrieked like crazy. I kept screaming for Max (my son) to get me the phone. He brought it to me and I immediately dialed my Dad’s number.

Three o’clock in the morning and my Dad answers the phone as if it were 2:00 in the afternoon. Perfectly calm and collected, like he was maybe just having some tea on the porch or something. I, on the other hand, was completely hysterical. I was shrieking louder than the “smushed” bat at this point and it’s a wonder that Dad understood me at all. I stayed there holding the pillows over the bat (pushing down pretty hard, mind you, just to be sure) while Max went to the door to wait for Dad. I kid you not, Dad was there in 5 minutes. He came into the bedroom, surveyed the scene and said, “You and Max had better wait in the living room.” Good call as my shaking, sobbing and weeping might have just gotten in the way.

He quickly disposed of it and came back out into the living room to inform Max and me that the bat had been killed. Now I’m the kind of gal who doesn’t believe that you’ve killed the bug/spider/bat or whatever without the proof of a body. Dad had skipped this all important fact and had chucked the dead bat out into the weeds. Great.

We actually had three more bat incidents within the next few weeks. Joe was once again gone during the second incident but I was on the phone with my friend when the bat did a “fly by” in the kitchen. My friend is a bit of a city girl and was horrified at the thought of a flying rodent in my house. She couldn’t believe that there could actually be wildlife on the inside of the house. She really was not the least bit helpful in my time of crisis and asked “Isn’t there someone you CALL for that?” Kind of makes me chuckle that she had a bat get into her house a few years later…

Joe was certainly present for the last two which kind of brought me some joy. We woke up to the sounds of flapping and I again pulled the covers over my head but was at least thankful that Joe was here to handle it.

While hiding under the covers with me (what?) he said, “Ok, let’s review what we know about bats.”

“We know this,” I said, “you’re going to get your (ahem) self out of this bed and HANDLE IT.”

So he slid to the floor, with a blanket over his head (which is silly because he’s bald anyway - it’s not like the bat is going to get caught in his hair or anything) and set off to face the challenge. When he came back a little while later he informed me that he “lost it somewhere, I think it’s in the basement”. No problem, I’m sure I can fall back to sleep easily. Just let me go put the bat netting over the children…

The next night, as I was making hotel reservations because we (Joe) had still not located the bat, we had yet another surprise. I was in the kitchen when I heard Joe’s voice from the basement say “WHOA!” followed by the sounds of him scrambling around. I closed the door at the top of the stairs and silently wished him luck.

Another incident actually involved Zoe’s hamster, which I know is considered a domesticated animal, but it’s still a rodent really. We woke up one morning to find an empty hamster cage. Of course, the usual chaos ensued. Joe, Max and Zoe were looking everywhere for the missing hamster - under couches, behind the furniture, in the recycling bin. No luck. I wasn’t so into the search. I figured it was all kind of fruitless and that the hamster was now running free with the other wild hamsters in the area and we’d never see him again. So, instead of officially looking, I went to make some coffee. (I’m no good to anyone without my coffee - oxygen mask on yourself first, and all). As I entered the kitchen, the hamster’s nose poked out from behind the stove. “Found it!” I shouted to the rest of the family and went about starting the coffee maker.

We’ve also had our fair share of run-ins with wildlife on the outside of the house. Mostly raccoons as they seem to be especially fond of our chickens (and not in a good way). We’ve tried using the traps that catch them alive but all we ever catch is the cat. After one particularly unpleasant chicken vs. raccoon interaction, Joe had had enough. That night, he geared up. He had on muck boots, shorts, a t-shirt and a head lamp. Plus, he was holding a shotgun. (Take a minute to sit with the visual…)

I heard the gun go off about 5 times and then Joe came back inside.

“Did you get them?” I asked.

“I got something, but it might’ve been the cat. I couldn’t really see very well out there.”

WHAT???? Ok, all you hunters, back me up on this one. If you can’t see, you don’t shoot, RIGHT?? I had visions of the kids waking in the morning to find our beautiful little Rosie cat, shot dead. Luckily, his aim was even worse than his outfit and the raccoons (and the cat) lived to see another day.

We’ve had all kinds of run-ins through the years – it’s just par for the course when you choose to live in the country. Still, if a rodent (domesticated or not) ever jumps out of the recycle bin onto my arm (one of my biggest fears), you’ll most likely read about it in the news.