Pissed opossum, havahart trap, eating the old and useless, Retail FAIL

The opossum hunt is back on. It took me a while to find  the small havahart trap.  Like so many other things I have tried to purchase these days .... it was unavailable to me in the brick & mortar world. ATTENTION: To all contemporary  retail  based corporations. Its not that  consumers are not buying.  Its that you are not selling.  Your business model is  WRONG!   Times are a changing! And you are not keeping up!

Ok ! Got that out of my system.

Now for Opossum.......... 

I put the  girls  to bed early and set up the havahart trap.  It didn't take long.  Jimmy and I watched a movie and went to check the trap and there was opossum #1, his cute little fingers desperately trying to reach the latch and free himself.    I couldn't leave the poor thing in there all night so we grabbed the keys and drove down to the local park and let him go.  We came home, reset the trap and went to bed.   This morning we woke up to opossum #2 .  This one spent the whole night in  there and he was pretty pissed by the time we let him go   in the same spot as his sibling.  Tonight we go for opossum #3.  Hopefully he did not learn from watching his  family  disappear  one at a time.    Jimmy has been singing  'Born Free' nonstop ever since we started this process.

It had to be done though.    Right now they are tiny and cute, but  a few months from now they will be full grown and  stealing eggs and keeping the chickens up at night.    Hashtag  keeps trying to  protect the other chickens from them and I am afraid one of them will kill her if they are allowed to stay.

Hashtag news: She no longer has her special  escape pen. She is big enough now to be in the pen with them.  One of the reds is seriously bullying her.  That same red is on death row and doesn't know it.  She is  at least 5 years old this year and possibly older.    She is also the loudest  and the one that calls for Jimmy and I for no reason. She thinks we should just sit outside and keep her company.  Her egg production is way down. So, the cranky  old hag who doesn't produce anything, bullies the youngster, and demands her own way in everything, despite her lack of contribution, will make the ultimate sacrifice  in about a month.  Moral of this story?:  When you are old and useless.... it might be a good idea to make   sure everyone  likes you so they don't decide you aren't worth the trouble.

Pissed opossum in a havahart trap

Backyard chickens and opossum. opossum hunt, night vision monoculars, havahart trap

I saw another opossum  out the back window last night so   I set up my   Wile E. Coyote net and sat out a distance away thinking it would be as easy as last time.  I was geared  up for benevolent war!  The net was laid out  with all enthusiasm, a hemp twine rope leading to my lawn chair,  which I quietly sat in and  kept watch with my night vision monoculars that Jimmy bought me for Christmas (for alien hunting).  It didn't take long.  After about 20 minutes  'they'  came out to nibble on the bait I had placed in the middle of the net.  The bait I had chosen was canned cat food which of course brought   the intrepid Drusilla  onto the scene and she frightened them off.  'Them' is definitely 2, possibly three opossum.  Siblings one and all.  I locked up the cat and started all over again.  They came out again after about 15 minutes.  I stayed quiet and still in spite of my excitement. I gave them all time to really start enjoying their snack and then gave the rope a mighty yank!  What I couldn't see with the night vision glasses was that the bright little creatures had nosed their way UNDER the net and were  eating it  from the backside. They got away again!  I then decided to go Rambo on them.  I put the net in the garage, got a big plastic bucket, moved my lawn chair into the chicken pen and put the bait back out.  I did my best Butoh. absolutely still and poised to pounce in the dark!  I sat there not breathing, in my pajamas  and waited for about 45 minutes before deciding  that I needed to rethink my strategy.  Yep.... I gave up!  I took all my toys, went in the house and  used the internet to find out if my local hardware store carried  a trap of any kind .  They do. Today I am heading out to buy a havahart trap.   Its worth the $25 not to feel outsmarted by the local wildlife!