<p>Very timely thread, lol! DH got a call today from DD: she and her hubby returned from a 2 week long vacation and smelled something funny inside their house. The smell got worse and became more putrid, so they eventually called a professional exterminator who pulled a dead raccoon out of a vent :eek: The critter tried to get inside the house, got stuck and perished. The kids live in the city!!!</p>
<p>Mini – a can of beer, poured into a bowl and put outside, will take care of those slugs, too. Pour yourself one while you’re at it, and you won’t care about the slugs! :D</p>
<p>We have foxes who sit across the street and torment our poor dog, who will not break through the invisible fence for love, dog treats or money. (She did so once when freaked out by a thunderstorm. Didn’t know we needed an EFC fund for her, too.)</p>
<p>Also have groundhogs, a six point buck who stared me down in my carport last week, raccoons, field mice, various other deer, etc. We also have many songbirds, which are the great joy of living in an older neighborhood where people have largely left their backyards to nature. Out of a sense of preserving nature or laziness, I’m not sure – but I do know the motivation at my house. ;)</p>
<p>Need to read about the chipmunk pool. We have a bunch under our front porch.</p>
<p>ACCCKKKK on the raccoon in the vent!</p>
<p>Turkeys. Foxes. Deer. Coyotes. </p>
<p>That’s nothing…been there; have had all those. </p>
<p>I’ve also had several bobcats, a large number of hawks, a couple of great horned owls (one of which tried to carry off my cat), and at least one cougar in my backyard. Brown bears have been known to show up in the local Smith’s (grocery store) parking lot that’s about 1/2 mile from my house.</p>
<p>And I live in the middle of a development well inside the city limits, not out in the country.</p>
<p>wis75, how did you get your ins. co. to pay for the raccoon damage? I thought that damage caused by animals or insects was excluded, the same way they exclude nearly all damage caused by water (unless you have an extra flood policy, of course).</p>
<p>It is a bad year for wildlife in my neck of the woods - poor crop of berries in the woods has driven black bears closer to cities in search of food. There have been many sightings of bears in nearby towns, and a local city’s councilmember has been mauled by a black bear. I guess it could be worse:</p>
<p>[Russia’s</a> hungry bears dig up graves for food | Seattle Times Newspaper](<a href=“http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2013277880_apeurussiagraverobbingbears.html]Russia’s”>http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2013277880_apeurussiagraverobbingbears.html)</p>
<p>:eek:</p>
<p>Wild turkeys are common in my back field. One Thanksgiving as we munched my mother looked out the dining room window and there was a parade of turkeys marching across the backyard. We stood at the door and counted, stopped counted (but they didnt stop coming) at 75… the noise was deafening. I think they were saying…“nananana you didnt get me!”</p>
<p>NorthMinnesota, I think we must live in the same suburb near the Twin Cities (literally!). All the same stuff, and a couple of years ago my neighbor’s dad was walking in the woods behind their house and saw a WOLF! He is from northern MN (up on the Range), so he knows one when he sees one. It didn’t stay in the area, but intdog and I were pretty wary during our nighttime walks for quite a while. Every little noise made me jump. I just try not to think about the cougar sightings. Intdog is big, but still…</p>
<p>A mountain lion was shot and killed this fall in downtown Berkeley. Of all the things I worried about when I sent my daughter to college, mountain lions were not on the list.</p>
<p>^^ Now mountain lions are animals we have had around here although I’ve not seen one even though they’ve been spotted within a mile of my home. We have lots of coyotes around though - I see them all the time including in my driveway.</p>
<p>Of all the things I worried about when I sent my daughter to college, mountain lions were not on the list.</p>
<p>I’ve been working on the i-90 wildlife project tracking the trails animals use & I admit that when we find cougar tracks, I keep looking above me & make sure that I am not a straggler!</p>
<p>I see raccoons sometimes, even during the day & possums, but the number of cats ( house cats )in the neighborhood, keeps the smaller animals down.</p>
<p>When I read “chipmunk swimming pool” here I thought the issue was chipmunks IN a swimming pool. </p>
<p>That reminded me of the wildest story from our 8-year family sojourn in Canada. A big news story had a MOOSE who walked into the family’s snow-filled backyard swimming pool. He was lifted out by a crane – the mechanical kind --and released healthy back into the wild.</p>
<p>Not at my house, out in the wild once I was tracked by a cougar. Hiked up a long mountain ridge one morning. It had rained, so we left some tracks. When we hiked back there were biiggg cat tracks in our wet footprints. It had followed us up the ridge, walking right in our footprints. :eek:</p>
<p>Sorry, off topic. But cougars make me nervous.</p>
<p>
If it was the other kind - that would have been something to see!</p>
<p>
They should - a lady was hiking a trail in the mountains due east of here (Cuyamaca mountains) and was killed by a mountain lion. </p>
<p>
And the number of coyotes around here keeps the population of the cats down. I lost a cat to one, my neighbor lost a couple of cats to them, and plenty of others have also. You have a pretty good clue when the cat disappears and then the next day the coyote comes back down your driveway looking for another meal.</p>