Critters
My old cockatiel hen once again got the yen to be a momma and laid a clutch of eggs. This has happened several other times in years past. They aren't fertile so will never hatch but I let her sit on them for a week or so before disposing of them. They are cute little miniature things. This time instead of putting them down the garbage disposal I decided they might be a nice treat for one of the critters that comes by the back yard just about every night and so I just set them out on the ground by some bushes. Within an hour or so that morning, the scrawniest, mangiest raccoon I have ever seen ambled by. He looked so skinny and hungry it appeared he was having a hard time walking. Something was hanging from his mouth like someone in a stupor.
I grew up in a suburb of Chicago. While the urban sprawl of that city doesn't generally make for a great wildlife experience for a kid growing up, some very wise person many years ago saw to it that a number of forest preserves were established throughout that area and they are the jewels of the region. Our house happened to be a few blocks away from one such preserve which became an almost sacred place to me eventually. It was the best place ever to ride a bicycle and in later years a wonderful refuge to get alone and walk and think. It was also home to a lot of raccoons. These were no country critters. They weren't the adorable little masked bandits. These were the downtown street thugs of the raccoon world. They knew precisely what nights were trash nights and they were the Mongol hoard of garbage. They would come, sometimes several at a time, tip over the garbage cans and proceed to pull out everything inside onto the ground, gorging on anything edible. With an endless, ready supply of nourishment several times every week, these animals grew to huge proportions. They were more like small bears than coons. And they were as fearless as bears. Confronting them on the patio would yield a pause and a look as if to say, “Yeah, what do you want? Can't you see we're busy?” They would leave only when you would start after them with a broom or whatever.
One season the coons were really out of control. For some reason their birth rate had soared. They were driving my father crazy. Once or twice I shot one with my .22 rifle. It was dicey because we were in the village limits and it was illegal to discharge a firearm. But a house makes a pretty good silencer. I would stand in the middle of the family room and having opened a window earlier, would have someone turn on the floodlights when the coons showed up. But the field of fire was very limited by the window opening, so getting a shot was difficult.
My father died suddenly that year and the mess the coons made was just too much for my mother. Something had to be done. A friend of theirs learned of the problem and brought by the solution: a live trap and a Benjamin air rifle. The coons crawled into the trap night after night and we had a dawn execution every morning for about a week and a half. The carcasses came in handy. There was a swampy, empty lot across the street with a stand of trees and bushes. Some ner-do-wells had hauled some plywood and old furniture in there and were using it for a dope den. I put the dead coons in and under the furniture and sheets of plywood and whatever. I figured the stench of rotting carrion would make the place a little less cozy. We never saw anybody over there again.
Okay, well enough of that. The coon that ambled by the other morning wasn't one of the Chicago coon mafia. He was this pathetic creature who really could have used a few eggs for breakfast. But he passed six feet away at most and didn't see them.
Within an hour as I sat by the patio door reading and drinking coffee, a rather small female possum ambled by, sniffing around as she went, looking for something to eat. I knew it was a female because she was very pregnant, her belly full of babies almost dragging on the ground under her. She also looked like those eggs would have done her some good. But she also passed them by so close that I couldn't believe she didn't see them. So near yet so far.
So this is going to seem like a really tacked-on moral of the story, but I swear it's exactly what I thought at that moment. I suppose it's because I was reading my Bible and was really getting some food for my soul from it. I thought about how many times I go into my day walking right past my Bible. Most days I actually read from one of several devotional books I get a lot from. But even then the Bible itself gets passed by some days. When I do read it, the spiritual nourishment is usually palpable. But so often I neglect it. It's a pity. It's right there, available, and I pass by.
I don't want to be the scrawny critter.
I grew up in a suburb of Chicago. While the urban sprawl of that city doesn't generally make for a great wildlife experience for a kid growing up, some very wise person many years ago saw to it that a number of forest preserves were established throughout that area and they are the jewels of the region. Our house happened to be a few blocks away from one such preserve which became an almost sacred place to me eventually. It was the best place ever to ride a bicycle and in later years a wonderful refuge to get alone and walk and think. It was also home to a lot of raccoons. These were no country critters. They weren't the adorable little masked bandits. These were the downtown street thugs of the raccoon world. They knew precisely what nights were trash nights and they were the Mongol hoard of garbage. They would come, sometimes several at a time, tip over the garbage cans and proceed to pull out everything inside onto the ground, gorging on anything edible. With an endless, ready supply of nourishment several times every week, these animals grew to huge proportions. They were more like small bears than coons. And they were as fearless as bears. Confronting them on the patio would yield a pause and a look as if to say, “Yeah, what do you want? Can't you see we're busy?” They would leave only when you would start after them with a broom or whatever.
One season the coons were really out of control. For some reason their birth rate had soared. They were driving my father crazy. Once or twice I shot one with my .22 rifle. It was dicey because we were in the village limits and it was illegal to discharge a firearm. But a house makes a pretty good silencer. I would stand in the middle of the family room and having opened a window earlier, would have someone turn on the floodlights when the coons showed up. But the field of fire was very limited by the window opening, so getting a shot was difficult.
My father died suddenly that year and the mess the coons made was just too much for my mother. Something had to be done. A friend of theirs learned of the problem and brought by the solution: a live trap and a Benjamin air rifle. The coons crawled into the trap night after night and we had a dawn execution every morning for about a week and a half. The carcasses came in handy. There was a swampy, empty lot across the street with a stand of trees and bushes. Some ner-do-wells had hauled some plywood and old furniture in there and were using it for a dope den. I put the dead coons in and under the furniture and sheets of plywood and whatever. I figured the stench of rotting carrion would make the place a little less cozy. We never saw anybody over there again.
Okay, well enough of that. The coon that ambled by the other morning wasn't one of the Chicago coon mafia. He was this pathetic creature who really could have used a few eggs for breakfast. But he passed six feet away at most and didn't see them.
Within an hour as I sat by the patio door reading and drinking coffee, a rather small female possum ambled by, sniffing around as she went, looking for something to eat. I knew it was a female because she was very pregnant, her belly full of babies almost dragging on the ground under her. She also looked like those eggs would have done her some good. But she also passed them by so close that I couldn't believe she didn't see them. So near yet so far.
So this is going to seem like a really tacked-on moral of the story, but I swear it's exactly what I thought at that moment. I suppose it's because I was reading my Bible and was really getting some food for my soul from it. I thought about how many times I go into my day walking right past my Bible. Most days I actually read from one of several devotional books I get a lot from. But even then the Bible itself gets passed by some days. When I do read it, the spiritual nourishment is usually palpable. But so often I neglect it. It's a pity. It's right there, available, and I pass by.
I don't want to be the scrawny critter.
posted by wingman at 12:05 AM
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