We have a groundhog in the neighborhood.
My cousin first spotted him a few months ago. She thought he was cute...even gave him a name. Albert, I think.
Groundhogs aren't cute. They're little monsters.
Not that little. Maybe this one was little once, and cute, but now he is big and fat. Because he eats. Everything. All the time.
He ate spilled birdseed, even when I mixed hot pepper with it. He ate my mom's ripened tomatoes. He ate our neighbor's last few plums from her tree. He, or one of his relatives or friends, regularly eats apples that have fallen off of a friend's tree a few blocks from here.
And he digs. He has tunnels all around our foundation, and in some neighbors' yards.
In a less suburban area I would be seriously considering getting myself a gun, or at least going on patrol with a stout shovel. I spent some time yesterday looking for smoke bombs to toss in his holes to drive him out. Today I set out a groundhog-sized Havahart trap near his burrow in our front garden. I baited it with a half-eaten plum, a pear, an overripe orange, and a cat food can filled with birdseed.
We'll see what happens. And if I catch him - then what?
The narcissistic primarily autobiographical blog of the pseudonymous d.b. echo
They are dangerous as well. I've known people who've badly twisted their ankles because of the mess a groundhog made of their yard.
ReplyDeleteIf you catch him call animal control, they'll know what to do.
Good luck.
ReplyDeleteI'll bet you won't have any problem trapping it. Ground hogs are just rodents.
My parents once decided to trap a raccoon that was raiding their feeders. 9 raccoons and 10 days later they decided to give up because they got tired of relocating them (which amounted to driving them 10 miles away are releasing them).