Its just a matter of the right bait.

As with all things, men or mice, it is the right bait that counts. In "Ben's" it was Kiwi fruit. Karen's plants would have done just as well, but I couldn't figure how to get the potted plant to stay on the trigger. It looks as though it will be an interesting year for rodents again. In a Google search I found that Packrats can have as many as five litters a year, with 5 offspring being the average litter size. They are mostly vegetarian's, except for 2x4's in your attic.

I have cut back on the number of Mice using my bench with a live trap. I am up to 12 now in my count. Following Goggle's advice, I have scattered packets of Quaker Oats all around the hanger as a preventative. They say that When they eat the Oats it swells up and, they died of constipation. :-( Nasty, but I have to get rid of them somehow. On my next trip to town we will stock up on the Sonic noise makers in the hopes of preventing them from coming in.

Last year during the fly-in, one of my friends was sleeping on a cot in the shop. A mouse used his nose for a springboard during the night. He moved into the house to sleep on the floor.

Plan D

One of my friends has suggested that " When the packrats outsmart you by accident....where can you run to?!?!?! ".

In the first place, I am not sure that it was an accident. If you haven't had any dealings with the varmint in question, you should not jump to hasty conclusions. There are stories of people driven to such extremes by their devious and dastardly actions that they lost control and tried to kill them by shooting through the walls in a vain attempt to get rid of the nuisance. They will while in the process of gnawing through the support beams of your house not even pause in their pursuit of your house's destruction while you are pounding on the ceiling directly under them.


The last time that Karen went to town, ( 130 miles one way) I had her buy the biggest "Ultrasonic Rodent Repeller" that she could find. I also talked her into getting some Rat Poison. She is dead set against poison, but that is how bad the Rats can be that she agreed. She has apparently hedged her bet by hiding it somewhere I cannot find it. ( She denies it of course) The sonic device works in a range that people and animals other than Rats and Mice cannot hear, at least that is what they claim. The only thing that I can see is a little red light. I installed a plug in the attic and plugged it in. Karen thinks that it might be working. We will see.


Not all of the various Pack Rat subspecies or individuals for that matter make all the right moves. If they choose the wrong place to destroy, it is possible to make some inroads into their own destruction. In fact Josie and I have managed to kill two of them in the last few days. One was caught in the pool cover, and with the help of Karen and Josie blocking, she was killed with the BB gun. (Very pregnant) Another chose to set up house keeping in my currently unused Hawk house. Not enough hiding places there. I suppose that it is the process of evolution, to weed out the ones who don't possess the proper amount of cunning to sufficiently aggravate the human population.


You will notice from the title that I am up to plan D. The first was just a straight forward Rat trap with Peanut Butter on the trigger. Well, he apparently told a bunch of Mice about the food on the top of the table. They sprung the trap and since it was a Rat trap, the killing mechanism just went over their heads. Once the ruckus was over they then came up and polished the trigger to a shine. He then re stuffed the food can full of the stuff that I took out of it, called it a night and was curled up somewhere in the hanger to await the next challenge.


I left the stuff in the can and reset the trap with more Peanut Butter. I checked it at Midnight to see what was happening. The trap was sprung, no Rat. I reset it. No action by morning. Apparently if I let the stuff alone that he puts into the can he would be satisfied to leave no trace of his existence. Sorry, its not happening.


I then set a repeating Mouse live trap on the counter, baited with dog food. I set the trap up on the food can to keep it out of reach of the Mice. I also emptied the can of "trinkets". This morning I found that he had licked the Peanut Butter lightly, but apparently was not the brand that he liked. He also picked up his trinkets and put them back into the can under the trap. (The 6 mice that I caught in the live trap were released for Josie to play with.)

He also stuffed that little piece of plastic in the trap to show me what he thought of my attempts.

This is the stuff that he put back into the can. There is no real rhyme or reason why he choose these items, but they are all items that he likes and uses. So my next move, since he doesn't like Peanut Butter is to use things that he likes. The shiny thing next to the screw is a chain link that he has stuffed in the can each time that I have taken it out.

So I am now using it as bait. We will see what the morrow brings.

Rats!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It seems a bit early in the year, but the Pack Rats are on the move again. Apparently all this rain is starting to worry them and they are moving to high ground. Actually there is no high water here, but there is a lot of rain, almost every time you turn around its raining again. Now don't get me wrong, I am not complaining, at least not much, it is more of an explanation rather than bitching. After all this is supposed to be a Desert, isn't it?

There are many stories in the West concerning Pack Rats and the pore individuals that have had to deal with them. They are devious to the extreme, Their common name comes of course from their liking for shiny things and their tendency to build large stinking nests of anything that they can find from dog turds to watermelon rinds.

Last year with Curly alive and well, we were able to keep on top of them.

He spent much of his mornings checking the places that they liked and with a water hose, dog and BB gun, they didn't have a chance.

Now don't get me wrong, Josie is a great dog. She is a total crack up, loves every one and every thing. Seriously smart, very sensitive, eager to please, and especially likes me.

She just hasn't gotten this rat stuff down yet. She has more of a tendency to point rather than pounce. Of course that is what all her breeding has prepared her to do, but I could really use Curly here to show her the ropes.

Karen and I were sitting in the hot tub the other evening at dusk, and I saw a Pack Rat run across the back of the pool walk way, and down in the covered area where the pool cover used to be. I jumped out, grabbed my robe, ran to the hanger to get the BB gun. Before I got back the rascal had left there and gotten into some of the rock jacks that form the fence around the garden. Karen and I stood out there in the near dark waiting and watching for him to show again.  ( The picture is there for you if you have the imagination. - Two old farts, wind whipping our robes around, blowing up our bare butts, peering myopically at rock jacks in the dark, trying to pick out a furtive #$%@&*^ Rat.) Finally he darts out and pauses enough for me to think that the dark spot that I see might be him. Damn, missed him by that much! I decide that I can't see him enough with the iron sights, so I run for the 17 Cal. Unfortunately it is sighted in for 100 yards, not to mention that my "shooting eye" has had the center of my vision burned out in a laser operation to stop blood vessel leakage. So at best I am operating at a disadvantage, but the stakes are high, and I do the best I can.             ( Last year they ate every Water melon and Cantaloupe plant that I put out, Not to mention the noise they make running around in the attic.) 

After a bit, never had much in the way of patience, I remember that this spring, one was drawn to the distress call of a Starling whose neck I was wringing, so I had Karen get me a varmint call. Soon he was poking his head out to see who was getting molested, damn! missed him by that much! He was on the run though, and as such was likely to make a mistake. He paused on the end rock Jack, and I blew a rock off the jack with a close shot, probably stinging him with the shrapnel. He paused again for a bit and that time I got him. Well since then, the one in the attic has blundered into a steel trap, at 1230 AM of course. I got another one with a pellet gun in the hanger, unfortunately leaving his partner free run of the hanger.

I am hatching some chicks, in the hanger for replacement of my aging flock. I had ground up some feed for the chicks and left the excess in a Coffee can on my work bench. Yesterday, when I went in to feed them, I found that the rascal had piled a bunch of stuff in the can of feed. It is likely that they do that to protect the food source from others, much as a Mountain lion would cover up a kill. Well I cleaned it all out, and thinking that this was the perfect opportunity to catch him, I put a rat trap baited with Peanut butter right next to the can. I went this morning to claim him for Peg's (Harris Hawk) morning meal and this is what I found.

Now I will grant you, I am not a neat freak, that would be a fairly hard claim to prove, but I can find anything I want, after a small delay of course.

The plastic that you can see stuck in the jaws of the trap is the handle to a battery powered body massager   ( the external type, if you were wondering.) that I was checking for dead battery cells. Now lest you come to the wrong conclusion about their intelligence, I am sticking with the thought that he was trying to put it into the can with all the other stuff and just dropped it on the trigger to the trap accidentally. At least I hope so, because if not then I am in trouble. However, he apparently wasn't all that impressed since he ate all the Peanut butter off the trigger after he sprung it. Could be a bad omen.

Another little weather window

The weather and wind abated a bit, and most of my spring projects are finished, so it was time to roll out "Dart", and burn a little gas. I wanted to see the Alvord to check the water levels. The weather forecast showed wind later in the day, but it was calm at 0800, with the temps at 52 degrees. There were rain clouds in the West, appearing as though they were either close to, or on the Steen's. I decided to go any way. My last flight was 10 days ago. I filled my "go Cup" with fresh coffee and did my preflight. Breakfast would have to wait until I returned.

I plugged my "Chilli Vest" into the power outlet, turned the heat up to max, tightened my "wild rag" and took off N W to the Steen's. The air was really nice and calm, even though I had a bit of a head wind. About halfway there the wind changed to my rear and and I picked up a bit of speed. I think I mentioned before that we have had more than 200 percent of our normal water fall this year, still getting it actually. Everything is wet and all the Playa lakes are full to overflowing.

Coyote Lake, about halfway between the house and the Alvord, is full of water.

The water on the Alvord is about 3/4 of the way across the lake bed.

In other words about 4 of the 6 mile width of the Alvord is covered in water. It started to rain as I cleared the hills around the Alvord, so I turned around and headed home.

We are hosting a fly-in of about 16 friends and pilots here the beginning of June. John Hauck of Alabama is on his way in his Mark III. He just called from Arkansas to check in. He should arrive late this next week, after visiting some of his other friends and a sister in Utah.

Here is a short video of the trip. I notice that I am getting a bit of a shake in the camera. I will have to add some more padding to the bottom of the mount.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yGMDrhdz5E4

Here is a copy of my track as shown on the computer. I have a "Spot" Tracker that I pay for to use to keep track of me and to call for either help or assistance as needed.

 

We are just about ready for company. I have been working on the pool, paint and a bit of patching on the steps. I intend to start filling it sometime this week. Not sure how long it is going to take to get warm enough to swim in, but gotta start sometime. The garden is about half in. I am afraid to plant any of the more delicate things, as we still get a bit of interesting weather some nights.

Spring appears to be finally coming.

It has been a very interesting winter and spring. We have had 213% of normal rainfall this year, and more wind days than normal as well. Perhaps we will be turning the corner soon. I have hibernated simply because I can, and thus caught up on my reading, and napping when the weather warranted it.

I have finally caught up on my "Honey Do list", a little concrete work and I should be done for the year. Nothing left but to play the summer away, fishing and flying.

The runway is in better shape than it has ever been. I rolled it with a home made roller and the quad several times after some of our more drenching rains. It has been bad enough that I have also done a lot of ditch work to direct the water away from the house and hanger.

Today the forecast was for 75 degrees and light for once winds. I got up at dawn and it was indeed as good as forecast. I dressed up with my "Chilli Vest", wild rag and rolled dart out of the hanger. I wanted to see how high the water really was and see if I could remember how to fly the plane. This was my third time this year of flying, so some remedial work was in order.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7-IugLiNDg&feature=player_profilepage

We are hosting a bunch of our flying friends the first part of June, so things should be picking up soon.