Woodpeckers

Get Rid of Woodpeckers

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woodpecker removal

How do you get rid of woodpeckers when your home is under attack by a woodpecker with an anger management problem?  Look, these nice people and I have an understanding.  They provide me with a hollow box with an opening just big enough for me to get in and out of, and a protected space inside that is perfect for my nest.  The hole is too small for most predators like larger birds or squirrels to steal my eggs, I’m safe from the wind and rain, and when my babies hatch, they can peep out of the opening and wait for my return with juicy worms.  In return, I give the people a nice nature show, since they like to carefully ooh and aaah over my eggs and watch me jump and leap and fly.  Occasionally, they even sweeten the deal with some delicious bird seed they throw outside.

It’s been absolutely wonderful, until this crazy bird came around.  Now I have to worry about how to get rid of woodpeckers.  For some reason, it thinks that it should live in my bird house, just because it’s bigger or flashier or has a harder beak than me.  Those aren’t good enough reasons!  I was here first.  Plus, these people want me here, not some stupid woodpecker.

But, it’s going absolutely nutso on me.  It’s pounding on the walls and the ceiling, and I have to keep on my toes to keep from getting skewered.  Really!  Won’t these people do anything to get rid of woodpeckers?  If they want me around so much, they need to make sure I stay alive long enough to lay eggs.  It’s just a big bully.

I think it must have overheard me telling someone about my wonderful nesting site.  I didn’t mean to brag about it.  It’s just so exciting to have found a safe and easy place in which to build my nest.  Now, I can just spend my time looking for soft building materials and eating as many grubs and worms as I can find instead of wasting all my energy flitting from one site to the next, hoping to build a home there.

The woodpecker must have followed me back, though, because, no sooner did I get home with some excellent twine to add to my nest than the pounding and pecking and hammering began.  As if the noise isn’t bad enough here inside my hollow box, every time I stick my head up, the woodpecker’s beak nearly skewers me.  And, now I’m trapped inside.  I can’t get out, because there is no let-up in its frenzied attack.  It just keeps going at me and at my box.  Does this woodpecker just want me to die of fright so it can get me out of here and come in?  I doubt she can even fit inside the hole.  At least I hope she can’t.

Why, oh, why won’t these people get rid of this woodpecker?  If it ever leaves, I may have to leave and find a more secret and safer site, and then they won’t have any sweet little baby birds to watch as they hatch and learn how to fly.  Serves them right!

Swallows

Get Rid of Swallows

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swallow removal

I’m just a sweet, old tabby cat who wants to take naps in the soft grass in the backyard instead of worrying about how to get rid of swallows.

There is a spot in the backyard that is a little spot of cat heaven.  It has been my spot and mine only for the last three summers.  The grass is soft, and wonderfully fragrant right after a good mow, the sun hits it just right in the morning, so it’s warm on my belly, but not too warm.  It’s right in between the house, where I have food and water, and the grouping of trees with its luscious and plentiful squirrels and birds.  I can chase them, if I want to, but as the years go by, I prefer to think about the chase as their chitters and chirps invade my cat dreams in the sun.

But, this year is different.  This year, my perfect napping spot is tainted by the presence of swooping, angry mud swallows.  At first, I enjoyed watching them as they flew between the small nearby pond and the house, tiny bits of mud in their beaks.  They would daub the mud up onto the house itself, right under the eaves, building up a nest.  I didn’t think much of it, although occasionally I would gather up enough strength to rise and swat at them as they flew overhead, especially after a little glob of mud rained down on my nose.

Now the nest is built, and I thought it would mean the end of the incessant flying back and forth and back and forth.  Little did I know it was about to become worse.  Now, my thoughts are on how to get rid of swallows instead of dreaming of chasing squirrels and deciding whether to go inside and eat or stay and sleep.

The eggs have hatched, and the tiny baby birds are amazingly noisy, keeping me from fully falling into my cat dreams.  To make matters worse, the two adult swallows now see me as a threat, and actually try to chase me out of my perfect cat-napping spot.  They swoop down on me, daring to get close enough that I think I’m going to get a beak in the neck if I’m not careful.  I have to watch the two of them at once, attacking and swirling around me.  I leap, and twist and bat at them with my powerful cat claws, but they circle around too fast and avoid my half-hearted attacks.

One of these days, I’ll figure out how to actually get rid of swallows.  Swallows come back year after year after year, and I just don’t want to deal with the constant chirping and dizzy swooping.  Sigh.  Maybe I’ll just look for a new perfect napping spot.

Skunks

Get Rid of Skunks

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I thought I was doing a good thing when I tried to get rid of the skunk out of the window well, but, instead, it acted like I was some huge, vicious, nasty dog that was attacking it.

My wife had decided this weekend was the perfect time to do spring cleaning, which meant a) no golf, b) a big honey-do list, and c) the kids would be bored out of their minds.  My wife does an amazing job with the house and the yard, and she works, and she takes care of all of us, so when she gets her mind set on spring-cleaning, I try to be as supportive as possible.  I tried to prepare the kids.  I gave them each a list of simple chores they could do, and when they were done, I presented them with a soccer ball and backyard goal.  My wife was happy they did their work, and she was happy they were happy, and she was happy that I was helping her out.

I was in the middle of a particularly grimy job in the garage when my little nine year-old girl came in screaming.  Her scream echoed in the nearly empty garage and pierced my ears, but then I finally understood the words she was hurling at me.  “Skunk!!  Daddy, there’s a skunk in the backyard!”

Skunk spray
A skunk getting ready to spray you.
(Artwork by Sharon Davis. Contact us for her contact info.)

I rushed out, calling out to the kids that they were to stay far away from it while I assessed the situation and figured out a way to get rid of the skunk.  Following my daughter’s directions, I saw the skunk trapped in one of the deep window wells.  I cursed myself.  Getting window well covers was actually on my honey-do list, and I was putting it off until the next day.  Woulda, coulda, shoulda, I told myself.

We get a lot of wild animals around our house, so I had already rigged up a make-shift animal catcher for emergencies.  My wife came out of the house, and stopped, eyes wide.  “Don’t you dare,” she warned.  “That thing’ll spray you, and the smell will get all over the house.”

“Trust me.  I know how to get rid of skunks,” I assured her, even though I knew I’d never done it before.  I actually managed to slip the leash around the skunk and pulled it free of the window well trap.  Thinking I had done my good deed for the day, I expected the skunk to give me a warm look thanking me before trundling off to freedom in the woods.  Instead, it bared its sharp teeth at me and growled, as if I had attacked it.  When it turned around and prepared to spray, my wife and kids retreated around to the other side of the house, while my wife grumbled something that sounded dangerously like, “I told you so.”  Well, some of us learn the hard way, I guess.

Pigeons

Get Rid of Pigeons

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“Get rid of the pigeon!  It’s in your kitchen.  You gotta get rid of the pigeon somehow.”

Dennis and Tom were stuck together doing a history project about President Truman, and, even though they didn’t really know each other, they had decided to hang out at Dennis’ house for the afternoon, get a pizza and get the project done.  Dennis’ parents both worked full-time, and he was an only child, so they’d have the place to themselves for several hours.  Tom got permission from his foster parents, and they walked to Dennis’ apartment after school.

Tom was kind of a quiet kid, and there were a lot of unkind rumors going around about him at school.  He never confirmed or denied any of the rumors, and Dennis suspected he started some of them himself.  So, Dennis had no idea that Tom’s father had died when he was three, and his mother was an abusive alcoholic, so Tom had been taken from his mother’s care and placed into a foster home.  His foster parents were nothing like the stereotype.  They were nice to him, let him have his privacy while encouraging his passion for reading and building model airplanes.

Dennis had both his parents, who, in his opinion, gave him too much space.  They left for work an hour before he walked to school, they usually came home three hours after he’d returned, and they went away on weekend trips a lot.  They told him how proud they were of him, and how self-reliant he was, but sometimes, he really wished they were there a lot more.

When the two boys walked into the apartment, they heard a crash in the kitchen.  Dennis dropped his bag and ran in there, followed by a more timid Tom.  Both boys saw the pigeon sitting on the edge of the kitchen sink.  It had knocked over a dirty breakfast bowl, which had crashed on the floor.

As they quickly retreated into the main room, Tom was adamant that they had to get rid of the pigeon.  “They carry all kinds of diseases,” he told Dennis, “And, they’re just . . . gross.”

Dennis secretly agreed, but he felt he needed to show off a little, first.  He started grabbing stuff from the main room, and, bragging that he could hit the pigeon with anything, he started throwing things at the bird.  A dustpan flew into the kitchen and clattered onto the floor, followed by a couch pillow and one of his mom’s stupid cat knick-knacks.  The pigeon flew up into the air, and banged into the window in a frantic effort to get out.  Finally, Tom took pity on the bird and stopped Dennis from throwing his textbook at it.  He quietly walked into the kitchen, opened the window, and said, “The best way to get rid of a pigeon is to let it out.”

Dennis frowned at his boring history project partner, and picked up the phone.  “Pepperoni okay?” he asked.

Bats

Get Rid of Bats

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bat removal

I have to wonder what bats must think, when we try to get rid of bats with tools that were meant for playing sports or cleaning the house.

Look, I know that sometimes entire bat colonies get in an attic, or bats roost in a chimney or people have bat colonies around their house.  But, a lot of times, it’s just one single bat that got curious or accidentally flew in a house.  Once inside, it finds a nice place to hang out, like high up on a wall, or in a fireplace, behind a curtain or on the back of a chair.  It might be a little bit worried about finding its way back outside again, but it’s pretty confident that it’ll be able to find its way back out, once it’s had a nap or pulled its wits together.

And, then, some human innocently walks into the darkened room and flips on a light switch.  Still, the bat might not move from its spot.  It’s comfortable, it’s safe, and it sees no reason why it should have to move.  So, it hangs out there for a while.  The person wanders around, doing whatever people do in that particular room.  But, suddenly, the person glances at a random spot on the wall, and sees a dark smudge just hanging there.  Somewhere, deep in that person’s brain, a fearful voice whispers, “It’s a bat,” and then there’s screaming, and running, and door slamming, and all of a sudden there’s several people all trying to get rid of the bat.

The things people use to get rid of bats, though!  It’s like, they grab whatever is at hand, whether it’s an empty box, a blanket, a tennis racket or the long, dusty, fluffy thing at the end of a pole that they use to clean off ceiling fans.

A whole chase ensues.  The bat flies frantically around the room, barely avoiding faces, heads and windows as it desperately looks for an escape route.  Objects are smashed or simply knocked over as the people alternate between trying to get rid of the bat to running away screaming to ducking and cursing.

And, what must the bat think?  It was happily minding its own business when it’s awoken and chased.  It is not a greased pig at a fair, it is not an escaped bull in a china shop.  It is simply a small bat taking a rest from looking for dinner.  Now, it’s trying to avoid getting its wings smashed in a butterfly net or by a cardboard box while flying around looking for a way out of this mess.

Let cooler heads prevail.  Call a professional to get rid of bats for you.  Tennis rackets are for playing tennis, blankets are to keep you warm, and ceiling fan dusters are for . . . well, you know.

Moles

Get Rid of Moles

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get rid of moles

People of the world, we earthworms implore you to get rid of moles.  It’s well documented that we earthworms are your friends.  We do not carry diseases or parasites, as other creatures who roam your backyard do.  We do not bite.  We do not scratch.  We don’t even bother your precious pets.  We don’t like to get into your house and eat your food.  We don’t damage your buildings and we don’t harm your children (except when they’re not too bright and swallow us whole).

No, on the contrary, we are excellent garden companions.  You may have invented the plow, but we were there first, plowing underground.  We mix up the soil, making sure the nutrients are well saturated throughout the soil, feeding all your plants.  We tunnel, making sure water and just the right amount of air reaches the plant roots.  Our castings even enrich your soil further.

So, why won’t you get rid of moles?  They are not a gardener’s friend.  They may not eat as much of your plants or roots as other animals, like voles or gophers.  But, trust me, the air pocket they leave behind in their tunnels is like a death sentence to the plant whose roots are affected.  Plus, voles, mice and other animals use the mole tunnels, too, and they do eat your plants.  Of course, you see the moles as an annoying creature, that makes mounds of dirt all over your property and destroys your vegetation.  We see moles in a whole different light.

Moles eat earthworms.  We try to get away.  We can feel the vibrations through the earth when a mole is digging nearby, searching, searching, searching for a mouthful of one of us.  And, we earthworms live under your grass, your flowers and your garden, which means that’s where the moles are tunneling.  Once they get one of us, we can only hope they devour us right then and there, if only so we can avoid the horror that awaits the rest of us.  Because, you see, moles are a lot like chipmunks.  They like to store their food.  Unlike chipmunks, a moles’ food is alive when it’s stored.  The mole bites us earthworms in just the right spot, so we have no more control over our motor functions, and then it drags us away and stores us in its burrow to be devoured helplessly at a later time.

If you get rid of moles, you help the earthworm population.  Moles eat us, your friends, your pals, your best gardening tool.  They decimate us and your plants at the same time.  Waste no time.  Get rid of moles now so we can return to our pleasant relationship.  You give us damp soil to tunnel through, and we will nourish your plants.  Moles have no part in that cycle.

Raccoons

Get Rid of Raccoons

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raccoon traps too small

Tears drip from my eyes, and I can not stop laughing as my roommate, Joe, stammers on about getting rid of raccoons.  The memory of his little-girl scream, the shocked look on his face, and the way he wind-milled back out of our fireplace makes me laugh harder every time I think about it.

“I’m serious, we have to get rid of the raccoon in our chimney!”

I know he’s serious, and I know we have to get rid of raccoons, but my laughing fit is making me hiccup out of control, and I can’t breathe, I’m convulsing so hard.  What makes it worse is our other roommate, Todd, is laughing, too.  I have to stop looking at him, or I’ll laugh myself into a coma.

Joe is kind of the macho man out of our group.  He’s the guy who spends at least two hours at the gym every day, bragging about his arms, even though most of the time is spent texting his girlfriend, drinking water, or looking in the mirror in between a couple of sets of grunting and lifting.  Hey, I don’t make fun of him, because neither Todd nor I can handle tools other than the occasional hammer or wrench, so it’s up to Joe to fix our toilet, install the new dishwasher, and, as of tonight, investigate whatever was making that noise up in our chimney.

We heard it at the end of our weekly game night.  We all have different gaming consoles, and we hook them all up in our living room, so we can rotate from game to game, trying to beat each other’s scores.  Some of our other friends were invited, too, but only on the condition they brought chips and drinks.  The raccoon in the chimney must have been making noise for a while, but we didn’t hear it until most of the guys had gone home.  Joe and Todd were picking up some of the empty cans while I finished up a game, and we heard a little scratch and a kind of chittering sound come out of our fireplace.

I didn’t bother to stop the game, until we heard it again, and Joe told me to shut up the game or he’d turn it off for me.  The three of us sat there, staring at the fireplace, waiting for the noise again.  When we heard it, a little rustling sound, we jumped up and ran around doing random things.  Todd ran for the phone.  He was going to call 9-1-1 until we yelled at him to stop dialing and hang up.  It couldn’t be that serious.  I grabbed a broom from the kitchen, although I’m still not quite sure what I planned on doing with it.  Joe ran for the fireplace, and banged on a spot just over the mantle.  He says he was trying to scare whatever it was, so it’d run back out and get out of the chimney.

None of that worked, and when we heard a noise again, Joe decided he was going to grab a flashlight and have a look for himself.

Flashlight in hand, he pulled the grate back, got on his back, and squirmed his way back into the unused fireplace.  At first, he didn’t see anything, but we sure knew when he did.   Raccoon eyes gleamed down at him from the dark, paws outstretched, and Joe screamed a scream that would have made a six year-old girl proud.  He’s still babbling about “getting rid of raccoons,” and Todd and I are still laughing hysterically.

Porcupines

Porcupine Control

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I think the porcupine believes that if we can’t see it, we won’t suspect we need porcupine control.  We have a porcupine that loves our yard, our trees, our shed, even our car.  And, for some reason, it believes it has a better chance of getting to stay on our property if it plays hide and seek with us.

At first, this tactic worked very well.  We didn’t suspect we had a porcupine control problem.  We had other explanations for some of the damage we found.  Our makeshift plywood door on our shed had a large hole chewed right through the bottom right-hand corner.  We thought it was raccoons.  We found holes scratched into our sod, and assumed we had opossums or maybe rabbits.  The undercarriage of my husband’s truck had scratch marks and a tire had been chewed on.  Again, we blamed raccoons.  For over a month, we were on the lookout for a couple of raccoons.  We were certain they lived in the nearby woods and had probably found a hollow log or other nice place for a den.  We even picked out names for them, in case we ever saw them.

So, the porcupine’s ploy worked.  We weren’t on the lookout for a porcupine.  It had found some perfect little hiding spots throughout our yard, and stayed well out of sight.  For a while, all we ever saw was the damage, and we blamed other animals.

One Saturday morning, we must have startled the porcupine, though.  It was going to be a warm day, and we had a lot of yard work to do, so we had decided we’d get up early, get it done, and then enjoy the hotter hours of the day at a cool movie theater, followed by an air conditioned restaurant.  We went out into the yard, pulled out our tools from the shed, and started working.  I was digging up some weeds when something bounced off my head.  It was a piece of bark from the tree I was working under.  I looked up, and couldn’t believe what I saw.  A porcupine clung to tiny branches far above my head.  As far as hiding spots go, that was genius, I have to admit.  Who looks for a porcupine up in the tree?  But, there it was – a fat little cumbersome body, its quills laying flat, little paws clutching the tree, and a mouthful of bark that it had obviously stripped off the tree on the way up, as a snack.

I called my husband over from where he was working on the opposite side of the yard, and he didn’t believe me, until he saw it for himself.  It explained all the damage in our yard – the shallow holes in the grass, the chewed up door to the shed, the trees with pieces of bark stripped from them, and even the chewed truck tires.  That’s a lot of damage for one porcupine, assuming, of course, there weren’t more porcupines playing hide and seek with us.  We called porcupine control and went back to our work, letting the porcupine enjoy his last moments far up in the treetop.

Feral Cats

Feral Cat Control

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feral cat removal

There’s a reason I wear thick jeans when I go to work as a feral cat control officer.  Some people prefer loose-fitting khakis with lots of pockets, or shorts when the weather gets really hot.  I didn’t normally discuss the fashion choices available to feral cat control officers, until the incident.  Now, I bring it up with all the new guys, just so they know what could happen to them.

The day of the incident was an extremely hot day, but our washer had broken down and my shorts and khakis were both in the wash, so I was stuck with wearing thick jeans with the brown animal control shirt my company has issued to us.  Grumbling, I headed into the office, grabbed a cold soda out of the machine and picked up my assignments for the day.  It was going to be a pretty easy morning, it looked like.  I had a nice, air-conditioned drive ahead of me out to a more remote area where someone wanted feral cat control to trap a stray cat that had been spotted in the neighborhood.

So, I stopped grumbling, hopped in the truck and headed out.  It was an hour and a half drive, and I was relaxed and in a good mood when I finally pulled up to the client’s house.  He explained that the reason he’d called for feral cat control is because a white cat had been roaming the neighborhood, getting into people’s garages, attacking people’s pets, and using his own backyard as its personal toilet.  He’d had enough and wanted feral cat control to get rid of the cat.

I went about setting up a trap in an area the client pointed out to me.  Apparently the cat preferred living in and around a wood pile in his backyard.  Fortunately, as soon as I started setting up the trap, I spotted the cat watching me.  Slowly, I reached my gloved hand out, making soft mewling sounds, and the cat immediately approached me, sniffing my hand.  Quickly, I snapped it up and held it in the crook of my arm to secure it while I grabbed a collar and leash that I carry with me.  I was surprised at how easily I got the collar and leash on it, and even more surprised that the cat started to purr and exposed its neck so I could pet it.  It was very sweet, and I wondered if it truly was a feral cat, or if it had been a domestic cat dumped out here.

I didn’t have to wonder long, though.  Suddenly, without any warning, the cat leaped up onto my shoulder, and then clawed its way down my back.  I twisted around to let it jump safely to the ground, holding tightly onto the leash so I could regain control of this wild cat.  It went up on its hind legs, hissing and spitting and clawing at the leash holding it captive.  But, when it finally realized it wasn’t going anywhere, it went on the offensive.  It ran around my leg three times, shortening its leash as it did so, and then grabbed my denim-clad leg, clawing its way up, up, up until its claws sunk into my thigh far too close to my unmentionables.  It hung there, tenacious, as I gasped and grappled with this wild animal.  Finally, I was able to tear it off my leg and get it into the trap and then into the truck.  I had to sit in the truck for about ten minutes until I regained enough composure to let the client know I had gotten rid of the wild cat.

And, that is why thick jeans are now an official part of my feral cat control uniform.  I will never wear anything else.