North Dakota seems to have an abundance of prairie dogs, a.k.a. dakrats, ground squirrels, burrowing rats. There is a large population of these little rodents living on the Air Force base. They burrow and make huge ankle twisting holes everywhere. When we moved into this house we had a few living around the base of the house. Technically you are allowed to remove them by trapping them for relocation. Yah right. We have some little traps that we occasionally use and a certain pellet gun that "stuns" them into sleeping! *wink* Micah has successfully sent a message via the prairie dog grapevine that a certain corner lot isn't the safest place to try and live.
Two months ago Micah started his mission to rid the yard of these pesky little creatures. Around that time I had come home one morning to discover a large mostly dead dakrat in the front yard. It's guts were hanging out and two crows were picking at it. I walked around near it and it's little leg started kicking. I was pretty grossed out. I called Micah to have him come dispose of the wretched little animal. If half it's guts hadn't been pulled out I probably could have picked it up. But I didn't. Micah wasn't at his desk so I left a very nice message telling him about the grossness of the situation and sometime at his leisure could he could and dispose of the carcass for me. Little did I know that his message system at work is like an answering machine and everyone in his office could hear me leaving this message. They had a great time laughing at my request.
Yesterday I was out watering the grass early and noticed that we had two dead baby prairie dogs in the backyard. They looked like they had been dead quite awhile. I called Micah and told him that he had some more carcasses to remove. He said he would do it at lunch so I left the little bodies where they were. Later that morning we were leaving to go to cooking club and I had Harmon go into the back yard to turn off the water. He saw the dead bodies and decided that he had better take care of business. I was waiting in the van and could not figure out what was taking so long. I went around the side of the house just to see him taking off Micah's big work gloves.
I was so tickled that Harmon thought he should get rid of those dead animals, and glad that he wasn't too squeamish to do it. They were a little bloody. Too gross for me. It is pretty handy to have boy or two around. That's 1.800.Harmonator...your trusty resource for carcass removal.
I used to stick a hose down the hole then stand over the hole and wait for them to come running and scratch at the bottom of my feet, I would throw them in a cage and take them out to an open field north of base and use them for target practice for my 223. It is also fun to going fishing for them with a treble hook, word to the wise get at least 30lb test, they are tough little buggers
ReplyDeleteI would have freaked out if I would have seen my son carrying a dead animal! Why I don't know because Me and my brothers would catch gophers in traps and cut off their tails. We would get a doller for every gopher. I hate rodents!
ReplyDeleteThat is awesome! Go Harmon!
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