Animal Encounters

On Sunday morning, following the wedding of a friend, my dad lent me his havahart trap so I could catch the woodchuck that's been hanging around the garden. When I got back to Old Orchard, I put some lettuce and rotten clementines in the trap and set it up by the white tool shed, close to the spot where I originally saw the woodchuck. My dad said not to put it directly on it's path or it will just meander around the trap.

Breanne woke me up the next morning, very early, before she left for work. There was a raccoon in my trap. I tried to fall back to sleep but I couldn't stop thinking about the raccoon so I got up and went out to look at it. It was a little bigger than I expected, easily filling up half the cage. It struggled to turn away from me as I approached. It's face was shaped like a cat's, but it's eyes were sad and dark, and large, like dog's eyes.

The raccoon was terrified as I put on my gloves and leaned down towards the cage. I picked up the trap by the handle and put it in the back of the PT cruiser, on a tarp. I drove it down the road and dropped it off at a little turnaround in the woods that has a "no dumping" sign posted at the tree line. The raccoon shot off the moment it realized the cage door was open, and didn't stop running for as long as I could see it. I'm sure I'll catch a lot of cats and raccoons before I catch my woodchuck.

Later in the day, after looking at the week long forecast, I decided to mow the lawn. While I was mowing by the white shed, coincidentally on almost the exact spot where I'd set the trap, I accidentally mowed over a frog. I didn't see it till it tried to hop away. It was entirely intact other than its back left leg which splayed at the knee like string cheese, almost to a separating point, giving him an extra crease of floppy leg, like a drawn out accordion. It was hard to look at and my first instinct was to put it out of it's misery, because it could barely hop. The idea of squishing the life out of it made me sick though, and I eventually decided that it would be better for the food chain if I let it live so some predator could eat it. At least, that's how I rationalized it.

The third encounter isn't nearly as interesting. I saw a big snake on my steps today and I lifted it up with a measuring stick but it shook it's way off and slipped under the steps. It had a very tiny head, even for a snake.

I also saw several other animals today, but nothing worth writing about.

*the picture at the top is NOT my own. It's just a general picture of a havahart trap.