Wildlife interactions...

So I had a delay getting to my yardwork today. While having my coffee, I heard the dogs outside. Barking. Frantically, loudly, at a high pitch. Without cease. *sigh*

I had to go check it out. They were clustered around the gutter downspout by one end of the back porch.
Trying to eat the downspout.

OK, not really, just trying to eat through it to get to the clumsy squirrel which had slipped down and gotten stuck in it, near the bottom. The dogs were in full cry, the hunting blood was up. And those darn squirrels do tease them, so I can't really blame them. But the downspout not only had lots and lots of scratches, but some serious punctures as well. I think, given time, they could have eaten through it, at considerable risk to their mouths from the resulting sharp edges. Not good.

So I had to get the squirrel out, preferably without having to saw through my gutter. But first I had to pen up the dogs, in the house, closed doggy door and all. I could still hear them, just not at such volume. So I worked for awhile at the bottom of the downspout, as that seemed most likely. There was some decomposed leaf matter, and I dug that out. It was there because of the brick paver blocking the front of the downspout, there from when the dogs were little puppies and I was trying to block access to that narrow space under the deck. Did I mention that is where the downspout ends? In an inaccessible area a few inches high between decking and concrete?

This didn't work. The squirrel stayed. It did not sound happy.

So I came up with the brilliant idea. Help it climb out! After all, it sounded like that was what it was trying to do, but couldn't get a grip. I found a length of chain, and decided it should go down the downspout and provide a ladder for it. After some frustrating (and no doubt amusing had there been any onlookers) activity where the chain was not going where I thought it should, I decided that I needed my own ladder first. So I had to extract that and carry it around and set it up. Several times, trying to find a relatively stable foundation. Anyway, eventually I managed to get the chain to slither down the downspout, and tied off the string I had cleverly tied to the end so it didn't just fall on through. I waited awhile, no sound from the downspout. I guess I thought it would immediately respond to the rescue! It probably thought the dogs were waiting at the top. But after I went away for awhile and left it all alone, it must have gotten the idea, because when I let them out again, it only took them 3 or 4 minutes of frantic sniffing and barking and attempted downspout deconstruction to decide that maybe it wasn't there anymore. Peace at last, and only about 2 hours lost!

I did still manage to feed gardens and plant potatoes and some other good stuff. The pansies are so pretty, and there are some early roses and other flowers, the snowbells, some daffodils, and the citrus is about to bloom - little round white buds all over it. But I am not getting the tomatoes out of the greenhouse yet. Maybe next week.

Big excitement this morning!

I was just starting to head outside for the morning perambulation with the dogs through the backyard - Aggie had preceded me through their own door, and Cassie was following me - when I heard the yelping, the dog door slamming open, and be the time I turned around, a dark shape streaking through towards the back bedrooms. Cassie went hysterical, and tried to figure out where to go for a moment, then followed her brother.

Oh boy. I realized that Aggie had chased something into the house through the dog door, and followed them to the back bedroom, where he was wedged under a table trying to get behind some boxes of books. Cassie was frantically trying to wedge in with him, and both were in full cry. Such excitement! Well, for them.

I just thought about what he might have chased in.

I called a friend whose cat had brought a (live) rat in to play with and lost it for awhile in her house. So a rat was my first thought, and I wanted moral support. I had not actually seen anything but a dark streak when I looked around before, so no visual on the prey. We discussed setting a trap closed into the room with something wedged under the door. I thought about where the trap might be. Meanwhile the dogs had whatever it was pinned down in a corner behind the boxes. Loudly.

I left the room to start looking for the trap or something... after a few minutes, when I had left the field of battle and was in the entry hall, the sounds changed, and I looked towards the living room to see a largish dark shape at full speed through the living room closely followed by the pack in full cry. Out the doggie door to freedom! Although I still never got a good look, it appears to have been a longish-haired dark cat. Whew! No rats! And a cat is more likely to understand pet doors. It didn't run like either of the similarly sized wild animals it could have been (coon or possum), so I am fairly certain cat it was. I don't think it will choose to roam my backyard in the future, poor terrified thing. Not that the dogs would have hurt it - more likely the opposite. Aggie's only close encounter with a cat left his ear bleeding profusely, and he was just trying to say hello. But the chase! If it runs, they will chase it, without thought of what to do if they catch it.


They are still, hours later, roaming the house on patrol, just in case. It is good to feel so protected. :)

Meanwhile, I have tiny seedlings starting to show, probably the radishes, but bits of green nonetheless. I am so glad I planted last weekend, with this nice warmer spell to let things get started and rain Monday to really settle them in. Lots to do this weekend in leaf cleanup and so forth. I planted a couple of 6-packs of pansies also, some where the daffodils have just started to show in a couple of places, and a few around otherwhere. My confederate rose is leafing out again, confused and vulnerable to the next freeze. The little one in the front has never dropped it's leaves. They all had such a hard time of it over the summer. I don't know what reserves they have if we have a bad winter on top of it. At least this nice long wet spell has brought many of the plants back to life.

I had better stop writing and get outside!