The vermin are taking over

The past couple Saturdays have been pretty exciting around here. Last week was the fox killing and this week I caught another varmint. Here is the story... Margo was out stacking wood Saturday morning, and Macy got to sniffing around the woodpile at something. Well, that something stuck its head up out of the wood and snarled at Macy. Margo thought it might be a weasel (which kills chickens) and this was only about 75 feet from the chicken coop. I was cutting wood on the other side of the property and Margo came and got me. I went and got the gun and we went back to the woodpile. I started moving wood around trying to flush out this mystery varmint but we weren't seeing anything. Then all of the sudden, Margo yells, there it is on top of the woodpile. And what vicious animal did we see, this one....



A baby raccoon. He was really cute. We think that this is the baby of the raccoon our neighbors killed last week that was trying to get into their chicken coop. So, what did I do with this varmint you ask. Well, I put on some gloves and caught it. It snarled and hissed and tried to bite at me quite a bit but I just picked it up by the nape of the neck so it couldn't.





I put it in a dog carrier and gave it some water and cat food. Margo and I were not sure what we wanted to do with it. It was really young so the thought of taming it and calling it Rascal crossed my mind, but I decided against this idea. I called and told my neighbor about it to see if he had any thoughts about what I should do. He wasn't sure either but said probably shoot it instead of letting it go. I know all of you soft hearted people are screaming at the computer "How can you kill a sweet little baby raccoon". Well you see, baby raccoons grow up to be big raccoons and big raccoons kill chickens. Margo and I thought about it a little longer and finally decided that we would go ahead and kill it, but right at that time our neighbor called back and said he had a friend who raises abandoned wild animals and would like to have it. This saved us from having to kill it. Unfortunately, later that night the poor little thing died on its own. We are guessing it was just too young to make it on its own without a mother and we found it when it was on its last leg. Probably for the best. It made for an exciting day though. I can't wait to see what happens next Saturday.