When I saw the live trap had turned 90o with the closed end facing me, I thought I had a nice easy triumphant post handed to me.
Only to find that he’d managed to get the bread from the closed end without triggering the trap. That shouldn’t be possible – perhaps a touch of lubrication after its long vacation is in order. I’ll work it out after breakfast.
I should have pointed out in yesterday’s post why killing the ground squirrel is actually necessary and not just a sadistic little hobby. Last year I had a plague of them, did battle with half a dozen before I ran out of squirrels that wanted to play. They get into the pantry, eat my food, and make a big insolent mess of it. They’re actually worse than packrats, which alone makes them special. But they’re too big for rat traps, hence the live trap from which they…do not normally emerge alive.
Squirrels are wily little beasts. Smart, strong, potentially destructive and dammit… cute! I learned a long time ago that it doesn’t pay to feed them or to encourage them in any way. In my case, as long as I don’t (accidentally or otherwise) offer them a source of food, we can coexist pretty well. I live inside, they live outside.
I feel that way about the chipmunks. We get them around here – I was watching one yesterday after the squirrel incident – and they’re the cutest little things. And they don’t get into my pantry. One got into one of my rat traps last summer and I felt kind of bad about it.
Ground squirrels, while clearly related to the tree squirrels I was used to in Michigan, are not cute. They are mean, businesslike, and in direct territorial competition with the rats. I kill them with something like pleasure.
Do ground squirrels make good dog food?
Opinions differ. LB prefers rabbit, Ghost turns his nose up at both.