I got bit by a possum.

[Deschodt]

Those possums look nasty with the teeth bared... Couldn;t figure out why my dog was sniffing at our deck, and barking in the same area, so I pulled one plank only to get greeted by a very unhappy possum... Lots of sharp teeth on the thing... I let it be while trying to figure out what to do (I tried capturing it)...

My dog beat me to it ;-) Brought it to me the next day....

[fintstone]

I used to hunt opossums and raccoons...etc when I was young. Skinned them and sold them to the older country folk. They baked opossum and muskrat but fried raccoon and squirrel.
We always caught the opossums alive and kept them for a week or two...feeding them corn and apples to get whatever nasty stuff they had been eating out of their system.
Put it on the grill and bite it back.

[Porsche-O-Phile]

All your possum are belong to us.

[450knotOffice]

"I have to ask why you didn't simply figure out a way to convince the armadillo to leave peacefully instead of shooting it."

Well...gee, as I walked inside to get the gun, I REALLY did contemplate having a real heart-to-heart with the little fellow. Do they understand English? Hummm. What if he was so cunning as to out negotiate me??? He may have moved into the main house with the wife!!???

F**K it ...I dispatched him MY WAY.

OK, first of all, lose the attitude. It was a valid question and I asked it nicely.

Convincing the animal to leave could involve all sorts of methods. I can't imagine it would be an impossible task. Let me put it another way, if we were neighbors and I had chickens and your dog somehow got onto my property and started harrasing my chickens, would you consider it cool if I dispatched your dog with a .22? Or would you prefer that I attempt to convince your dog (somehow) that it doesn't want to be on my property?

I suppose that as I walked inside to get my gun, I'd contemplate having a heart to heart with the little doggie, but then I'd decide, hey, he might out-negotiate me and try to get into my main house so F**K it, I'll just get rid of the furry guy my way. Now, where's my gun?

[Mo_Gearhead]

Well Scott,
I don't have neighbors with chickens and if you are putting dogs in the same catagory with armadillos as far as intelligence, you need to adjust YOUR attitude as well. Do you have to put up with the digging bastards (armadillos) in your yard where you live in CA?

I considered it a pest and I shot it. That is my 'Missouri' attitude. In Calif. I assume you can call the ASPCA and have them come rescue the little fellows...here, we just KILL EM! Bet we both sleep well at night.

[bkreigsr]

[450knotOffice]

My example was a hypothetical one. I'll give you another one that's similar to yours. Hypothetically, you have a neighbor who hates dogs - considers them pests (yes, dog haters are out there). Your dog manages to end up on this neighbors property and proceeds to start tearing up this person's yard. He says to himself, "damn pests"! He goes to his house, gets his gun, goes back outside and shoots your dog. He doesn't give a damn - just a pest in his eyes. Forgetting the legal issues for a moment, would this be OK in your eyes? I'm guessing not only no, but he11 no. My guess is that you would prefer that this (hypothetical) neighbor of yours would have just somehow convinced your dog to run a way. That dog of yours is part of your family.

It has nothing to do with the relative intelligence of dogs vs. armadillos, btw. Where'd you get that? I never said that.

And btw, I'm not insulting you personally, but I sure see the insults coming my way. Your response to my question was condescending and patronizing, as if you were talking to a kid. I'm not a kid and I'm not some unintelligent, simple minded tree hugger. I simply decided a long time ago that all of us on this planet (animals included) have one go-around on this journey called life. Who am I to decide that it's over because I don't like that animal in my space. If I choose to end the animal's life, that's it for the critter. Game over. So I try to avoid killing anything if at all possible. As an aside, I happen not to be a vegetarian either, even though it sounds like I would be. I happen to feel that we as humans are omnivores and thus need meat, therefore hunting for meat is something I can understand.

Milt, sorry for the hijack. Your story is amazing. I'm really surprised that you didn't get popped by that guy.

[Tobra]

Originally Posted by 450knotOffice

It has nothing to do with intelligence. Where'd you get that? I never said that. Is that the determinate for life?

Struck a nerve, apparently.

Dude, an armadillo is like a big rat that carries leprosy, among many other nasty infectious diseases. You do not want them around, at all. Granted, I might take a hose to him first, try and discourage him, but it would be the recently departed Mr Armadillo going into a plastic bag PDQ if that failed.

BTW, if you got a dog killin' chickens tie a dead one around his neck for a few days, he won't want to have much to do with the chickens you just bought from your neighbor after that

[Mo_Gearhead]

Scott,
Look, all I am trying to indicate to you is this; I dont equate "pets" or any domesticated animals (ie dog, cats, horses, cattle, chickens, pigs, monkeys, hamsters, rabbits...etc.) with pests!

In Calif. perhaps armadillos may be pets? Put them on a leash, keep them in your house, train them to sit up, go fetch ...do as YOU please. In Missouri we don't (QUOTE "try to convince the animal to leave") that are pests, we shoot them!

I won't change your attitude and you won't change mine. Agreed?

Happy driving.

Next thread!

[Tobra]

Do not keep an armadillo for a pet, unless you want to get to know your friendly local infectious disease specialist. Not so bad if you live in Montgomery Co, TX, good friend of mine is there. You'd like him, he has a cool car.

[450knotOffice]

Very good. We've made our points. Good discussion, afaiac. We'll agree to disagree and move on.

So...How 'bout them Rams (my former team).

[teenerted1]

Originally Posted by Jim Bremner

I live in Cerritos Ca,

My kids saw a coyote last night. there's no open space for that thing to live in 20 miles!

the dont need no stinking open space...even an elevator or train seat will do for a little while. but watch out for those Bellevue mailmen.

http://www.hcn.org/servlets/hcn.Article?article_id=13461




http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/soundoff/comment.asp?articleID=324731

Posted by ltfd at 7/22/07 11:43 p.m.

Coyotes have been expanding their range for well over 100 years, and their habitat includes the cities and suburbs- plenty of food opportunities for them year round. We are not expanding into their habitat; they are expanding into ours. Coyotes have a higher population density in suburban areas than they do in rural areas because there is more food available and it is easier to get.

I've watched them roam in my Grandmother's gated & fenced neighborhood in Laguna Beach. I've seen them in backyards a block off of Sunset Blvd. in Los Angeles. They sauntered around my backyard regularly in Lake Stevens, where there are alot of greenbelts, and I've seen them in the alley behind the Highpoint Fire Station on 35th Ave. SW. They are everywhere.

You can shot or poison them in your Madison Park yard, but there will be just as many or more in the area a season or two later. I have lost a bunch of cats to them over the years (I assume, since they disappeared), but my cats killed lots of native species like shrews, mice, birds, frogs, snakes, etc. It's the law of the urban/suburban jungle. Cats kill prey, cats are prey. They are probably the coyotes' version of a Big Mac or a Whopper.

Posted by sabre635 at 7/22/07 11:58 p.m.

I remember seeing one more than ten years ago between Ravenna Park and U-Village. From far away it looked like it had a small dog in it's mouth.

Posted by WeWantPiranhaClub at 7/23/07 2:10 a.m.

"In Bellevue last year, a coyote bit a 1 1/2-year-old boy on the ear at a playground, and a 4-year-old boy was bitten in the yard of his home. Still, "you have a better chance of being run over by your mailman," Chandler said."

Does this mean that at least three people in the greater Seattle have been run over by their mailmen ? ? ? ?

[Zeke]

The only thing I can add is that some animals are a bother in one place, where they aren't in another. Squirrels in the farming country can disturb irrigation. In the pine trees, they bother no one. A dog is a pet. These other animals are not. We don't kill animals in CA metropolitan areas. Just a difference in the vast country where we live.

You can see why there are so many opinions on the illegal labor problem if people can't agree what to do with an armadillo.

[sammyg2]

I don't think we have armadillos around here. I've never seen one except on mutual of omaha's wild kingdom. Anyone remember that show? The grey haired old guy used to wrestle with anacondas and wild bores and crocs and all kinds of stuff. Way before that guy from Australia played darts with the sting ray. He used to crack me up.

[sammyg2]

LOL, a quick google search came up with this (kids, this is how a professional hijacks a thread):

Biography: Marlin Perkins
Marlin Perkins, recognized as one of the leading ecologists and naturalists in the world, helped bring wildlife into American living rooms. Perkins' interest in animals began long before his adventures on Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom.

Perkins began his zoo career in 1926, literally working from the ground up with the St. Louis Zoological Gardens. He was put to work on the Zoo's laborer crew, where he helped maintain the zoo grounds. Perkins quickly rose through the Zoo's ranks, becoming curator of reptiles in 1928. In 1944, following seven years as curator of the New York Zoo in Buffalo, N.Y., Perkins was appointed director of the Lincoln Park Zoo in Chicago. Under Perkins' direction, the Zoo became internationally known, in part from the Zoo Parade television series, which ran on NBC from 1949-1957.

Perkins' career came full circle in 1962, when he returned to the St. Louis Zoo as its director. He became director emeritus of the Zoo in 1970. It was during Perkins' tenure with the St. Louis Zoo that he, along with producer Don Meier, began work on an idea for a new television program. Mutual of Omaha's "Wild Kingdom" debuted on January 6, 1963, and was in original production for 27 years. The program received four Emmys from the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences and was the first television series to receive the National Parent Teacher Association's (PTA) "Recommended for Family Viewing" designation.

Marlin Perkins passed away in 1986 at the age of 81.

From wiki:
Although Walt Disney had fabricated footage of a mass suicide of lemmings in its film White Wilderness, Marlin Perkins punched a reporter, Bob McKeown, who asked questions about whether wildlife films were inaccurately staged.

During his career, Perkins suffered multiple bites from venomous snakes. During a rehearsal of Zoo Parade, he was bitten by a timber rattlesnake. In other incidents, he was also bitten by a cottonmouth and a Gaboon viper.

Gotta love an old guy who is tough enough to get bit by snakes and punch reporters

[imcarthur]

Now, Marlin wouldn't have shot that possum.

He'd punch him to death.

Ian

[imcarthur]

Oops. I guess it was an armadillo that got shot . . .

Ian

[Zeke]

Damn. There he/she is! Big molars. Bald toes and tail. Not a pretty animal.