So A Possum and A Groundhog Go Into...

Apologies for a lack of posting since the 15th - it's been a strange month what with family emergencies and the sad, sad death of my garden (viciously murdered by stinkbugs).

Also - for the last 2 weeks - we have entertained a visitor (see above photo). **Disclaimer -none of these photos are mine, simply because the subjects seem to know when I have a camera and remain hidden.**

Frankly I suspect all groundhogs look alike -including the one making himself at home under our neighbors home. It's sitting vacant, except for an occasional visit from their teenage son to mow the grass. I haven't been able to catch him yet to ask permission to put the live trap on his property, so instead, it's been under our oak tree, where said groundhog breakfasts, lunches and has his dinner.

See, our front yard is "downtown" for our groundhog, while the neighbor's house is the suburbs. He runs across our driveway to munch on our acorns, right after sitting up to wave at me, just like the photo above.

Now here's the thing: he's awfully cute. But he will bite if cornered, and he's getting big. Bigger than our schnauzers. If he is a he, then he will just hibernate under the house till next spring, then continue to raid my garden. However, if he is a she, she will hibernate and have a lovely little family of 4-6 pups in the spring. When they are big enough, each one will want it's own burrow, making our house prime real estate property.

The furry cutie has to go.

The war is on.

So we have a live trap -one you open at one end, place food in the other end, and said groundhog wanders in to get the food, triggers the door, and is safely contained so he/she can be moved to a remote location.

That's the plan anyways.

Unless the trap is set out under the acorn tree and an earlier diner guest shows up, in this case the possum from the back yard, who usually eats the cat food by the back door, and actually came inside the back door the other day to remind me I had forgotten to put food out for it.

Turns out possum loves apples smeared with peanut butter as much as the ground hog does.

And possum got there first.

He was not happy.

Until he realized he was trapped inside WITH the apples and peanut butter, at which point he turned around and started eating. Then he went to sleep. When we found him next morning, he was still sleeping. We woke him up to tilt the cage and boot him out, but he was having none of that.

He stayed. All in all, for a trap, it was an impressive abode. He went back to sleep.

Then we started worrying about him being out in the light, so we got a blanket to put over the cage. And then we made sure he had some apple left.

All day we turned the cars around next to the tree, the postman came in his truck and turned around right next to the tree, dogs barked - none of it mattered. Possum slept on, oblivious to it all, curled up under the blankie.

He didn't leave until well after dark, some 10 hours later. And he left the blankie, but took the apples.

I am fairly sure I could hear the groundhog snickering over in his/her burrow.

Why I Never Garden At Night

We have a large backyard with no lights. At various times we've had visits from deer, horses, large roaming dogs, a fox, snakes, and at one point a huge groundhog

All of this slipped my mind last night when I called the dogs in from their fenced yard, and all but one came in willingly. After much shouting and threatening, I went and got a flashlight, walked all the way to the furtherest corner of the puppy pen and dragged said puppy kicking and screaming into the house. He was very indignant and insisted he had cornered something in the yard, and I was ruining his 15 minutes of fame.

As he ran into the house, I heard *something* banging either on, or in, the greenhouse. Out in the dark.

So I came in, and yelled the magic words up to DD: "Hey, you wanna go on an adventure?"

She's gotten smarter over the years, so now she asks: "Where?"

We grabbed a baseball bat, and a plywood template for a miniature coffin lid (don't ask, just think Halloween), both to attack anything that might jump out at us, and started out to the backyard. Out in the dark.

Fortunately, DD had the bright idea to turn on the garage lights, as well as the light at the end of the garage. Which saved us from stepping on a baby possum. Apparently it's mama had left it in the grass, and said "Wait right here, and don't move an inch. I don't want to have to chase you around the yard." So the poor little thing waited right there, and found itself in the middle of the walkway, under a giant spotlight, with two giants approaching. But it listened to mama, and refused to budge.

We budged instead, going back the way we came, and all the way around the puppy pen, down the far side of the yard out to the greenhouse. I was thinking it was probably mama possum trying to either get in or out of the greenhouse, after looking there for food.

At this point we realized if it was mama out there, we had placed ourselves between her and baby. And this far out in the yard, it was pitchblack. The greenhouse door was latched, and nothing was inside, and the neighbor dogs were starting to bark and howl at us, so we backed down the yard, without encountering either mama or baby again.

DD has decided to name the baby possum Bartholomew.

It is probably unaware of this, but I think it's the perfect possum name.

***NOTE: Since we had our hands full of flashlights, baseball bats, and coffin-lids instead of cameras, these photos are from the net. Google is our friend.