So a few weeks ago I got tired of the packrat that turned the nice neat stacks in my woodshed into a big pile of wood. I set the T-rex and killed it in a single night. Then I cleaned up the woodshed.
As was pretty much inevitable, the woodshed immediately acquired a new packrat which left the wood alone but accumulated a huge pile of other nesting stuff right where new wood needs to go. I’ve never understood their love of dog shit, but that was where a lot of LB’s mysteriously disappearing offerings had gone. 🙁
So I cleaned it all up, hauled off the pile of treasures, and set the rat trap.
This rat was not amused, and by this morning had sent me what I can only interpret as a challenge.
A pile of firewood, right next to the ostentatiously-ignored trap.
I had mice in here one year. First I found where they came in… always a good idea, and plugged it good. Then I set out traps. Cheese, marshmallows, lots of things as bait, but the mice were ingenious at getting the bait off without springing the trap… new traps too. Then I tried peanut butter. Killed lots of them, but it’s a pain to deal with them after – and setting the traps can be very painful anyway. Finally, I set out rat bait trays and forgot about it. Didn’t see any more mouse sign after that. Still none years later.
Then, just yesterday, I got some things from deep in my store room and found a dried up mouse carcass. Thank goodness they are small. Never smelled that one. 🙂
But yeah, that pile of firewood is an insult for sure. Got peanut butter? LOL
I’m using peanut butter. Usually works. Tonight I’ll see how he likes pb&J. 🙂
A buddy and me (Or is it I? Can never get that straight) were hunting in Colorado out of a small log cabin. The place was just full of pack rats that bugged me no end by scampering all over the place as soon as the lantern was out. My buddy told me to suck it up and live with it. That is until he found out they had bored a small hole in his last pack of cigarettes and emptied it out.
That night after the light went out and the scampering started I heard his flashlight come on, then his 30-06 went off. He didn’t warm me first either. I did make him clean up the mess in the corner and promise never to do that again.
It’s easy to remember, just remove the modifier. So if the sentence is “A buddy and me were…,” remove “a buddy and” and adjust “were” to singular. Then the sentence begins “me was,” which is clearly incorrect.
By this rule, correct construction would be “A buddy and I were hunting in Colorado,” or “A packrat offended a buddy and me.”
You have to know these things when you’re a hermit, you know. 🙂
Wow, Joel – I’m learning all kinds of neat stuff on your blog. Bread baking tips, off (WAY off) grid techniques, rat killing, and now gooder grammar. Thanks! 😛
I’m not impressed with the t-rex — I’ve never caught anything with them and ended up going back to the old style wire traps which seem to work every time. I even had one eat the PB&J right off the t-rex without triggering it.
If you have problems with the mice/whatever stealing the peanut butter from your traps, next time take a bit of sewing thread and wrap it a couple of times around the baited peanut butter, their teeth tug on the thread when they go for the peanut butter, and WHAP! 😉
I’ve found that once a trap has had something dead in it, I need to clean/deodorize it before I can catch another rodent w/ it.
With all the droppings there, be careful of the Hanta virus when stirring up dust.
Joel, thanks for the tip on I vs.me. Next, can we address lie vs. lay?
As an aside, the basis of many hemorrhagic rat poisons (warfarin) was developed right here at U of WI.
Re: Lie vs. Lay – I got nothin’.