BS: Varmints

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: keberoxu
Date: 03 Jun 22 - 12:13 AM

The recently leafed-out trees, green as green can be,
are shedding some kind of caterpillar things.
I say shedding, when it fact what happens is
the caterpillar thing spins a thread, someplace up in the branches,
and then this thread dangles down from the foliage,
hovering in the air, with the itty-bitty skinny caterpillar at the end.

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Senoufou
Date: 05 Jun 22 - 02:16 AM

Mrs Quackie waddled over to my front garden with TEN ducklings in a line following her. Tiny little fluffy things. No sign of her husband though. I was worried that the numerous cats around here will have a field day massacring the entire brood. Or some might fall down the drain gratings in the road. Even crossing the road with these babies is dangerous - some silly drivers zoom around the village like F1 racers.

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Donuel
Date: 05 Jun 22 - 04:18 PM

This is the most colorful criminal varmit you may ever meet.
Warning: This guy is addictive as binge watching The Sopranos.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cC1LFC0KFSw

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Senoufou
Date: 07 Jun 22 - 02:02 AM

Oh Donuel, what a thoroughly nasty man eh? He's so proud of himself.
A real 'varmint'!
Mr Quackie appeared yesterday, but no sign of his wife or babies. Instead he had a male companion at his side. Has he become gay? I expect Mrs Quackie and her brood are now down by the river, which is far safer for them.
I now have a multitude of hungry starlings who descend on my front garden to eat the bread I put out for them. But they will insist on leaving a 'present' on my neighbour's car which is always parked outside on the road. Should I put up a sign saying 'EAT BUT DON'T POO!'? But no doubt they can't read can they?

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 07 Jun 22 - 05:18 AM

Mallards don't stay together for long and I'm not sure that many birds do? I think some swans are an example of birds that can pair for life.

Looking Mallards up on the RSP site, I see:

The role of the male is almost over once the clutch is laid. He remains sexually potent for a while in case a replacement clutch is needed, but gradually loses interest and joins other males to moult. At this time groups of males with no obvious duties often mate forcibly with females that appear to be unattached. This anti-social phase is short-lived and ends once moulting is underway.

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Senoufou
Date: 07 Jun 22 - 06:08 AM

Thank you Jon, that's most interesting.
The same thing could be said for ... er ... African men and their English wives ... :)

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Senoufou
Date: 11 Jun 22 - 03:06 PM

The latest news in this area is that a new place has opened recently. It's called 'BugzUK' and comprises a sort of zoo in which one can view a variety of insects and creepy-crawlies in their glass cases. There are tarantulas and other gruesome spiders, cockroaches, scorpions, giant millipedes etc.
I was horrified to learn that for an extra couple of quid one can enter the 'touching room'. An assistant brings in some choice specimens for one to hold, stroke and cuddle.
My neighbour went with a friend and held a huge spider. Gaaaaaagh!! Then she found that a millipede's feet are 'quite bristly'.
Schools are now bringing parties of children to experience this treat.
It's in Nowhere Lane (!!) in a village very very near to mine.
I hope the giant spiders don't escape and head up the road!
This place gets madder and madder.

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Donuel
Date: 11 Jun 22 - 03:26 PM

giant spiders give me the creeps but newts are cute.

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: keberoxu
Date: 11 Jun 22 - 05:22 PM

Nowhere Lane, indeed ...
you cannot make up this stuff, can you?

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: keberoxu
Date: 11 Jun 22 - 05:33 PM

Re post of 3 June:

I believe those itty-bitty things are gypsy moth caterpillars, yuck.

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Senoufou
Date: 12 Jun 22 - 01:47 AM

I looked that up keberoxu, and Gypsy Moths are also called Spongy Moths. Apparently they de-leaf trees at an alarming rate.
Yes, Nowhere Lane always makes me smile. We went for a little drive yesterday and passed through Fustyweed, then headed for Little Snoring (next village on from Great Snoring - honestly!)

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: keberoxu
Date: 16 Jun 22 - 06:45 PM

Now it's the little gnats.
They sneak indoors on one's person, one does not even know it,
and then once they are in a room with people in it,
they are literally IN YOUR FACE
and you sit there frantically waving your arms and hands around ...
harder to squash than mosquitoes, they are.

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Senoufou
Date: 17 Jun 22 - 01:57 AM

Sitting on The Bench (as I do for most of the day) I think some nasty insects had crawled up the legs of my jeans, because I now have several itchy-scritchy bites from the knees down.
But I was delighted to hear a cockchafer (very loud, deep buzzing) then I saw it hovering over the rosebush. They bumble around like a vibrating golf ball. But a rather hungry male blackbird was also delighted to see it, and gobbled it up!
Nature red in tooth and claw eh?

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: keberoxu
Date: 10 Jul 22 - 05:02 PM

Repeated Mudcatter reports of rabbits rabbits rabbits at the moment.

I see rabbits every time I travel anywhere.
A rabbit ran around a shrub in front of me, when
I stepped outside early this morning.
Cottontail rabbits, these are, in the New England area.

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: keberoxu
Date: 12 Jul 22 - 08:44 AM

Well, the itty bitty skinny caterpillars are having their way with the rest of us this year, it's a proper infestation.
First, the skinny caterpillars proceeded to devour the foliage on the trees, and the caterpillars got big and really ugly looking.
Now they are moths, BANG just like that,
it has been barely two weeks.

Little moths with dirty dishwater-brown-looking wings.
A lot smaller, if you ask me,
than the big ugly caterpillars were.
The darned moths came out all at once
and they are all but swarming, they are everywhere,
and they are in your face and hair and the back of your neck and UUUGH.

Before they are done,
they will make a disgusting spectacle of the trees
by covering them in this webby looking thing that kills off the tree itself.

This is a periodic thing.
It did not take place in the past two summers that I was here.

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Senoufou
Date: 14 Jul 22 - 03:21 AM

The terrible drought here has produced a plethora of sweet little frogs looking for water. I've picked up several and popped them in a large shallow tray of fresh water which I keep outside for the wildlife.
This morning I found another one and he looked so delighted to be up to his head in some water!
One of my neighbours has a 'frog phobia' and screams blue murder if she sees one. Another screams if she spots a rat or a mouse. I only scream if I see an enormous spider.
Still no sign yet of the huge BamBam oak statue in front of our pub The Fox.

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: keberoxu
Date: 14 Jul 22 - 08:20 PM

Well, today offered me a two-fer.

A little cottontail rabbit, ears perked straight up,
was busily grazing on the newly watered lawn grass.

An even littler chipmunk / ground-squirrel, all stripes,
hunkered down under a shrub.

As I walked past on the pavement,
the ground squirrel made himself scarce.
The rabbit, however, was too preoccupied with stuffing his face
with lovely green grass to budge from the spot.

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Senoufou
Date: 16 Jul 22 - 02:18 AM

How lovely keberoxu! That would have enchanted me.
Yesterday evening as I sat on The Bench, a huge crowd of crows gathered in the skies above our village. I have never seen so many at one time, they blackened the entire sky!
I think they were arriving to drink from our small lakes and the river Wensum. There's a serious water shortage in Norfolk now, and the wildlife must be desperate.
The collective noun for crows is 'murder' - so I was watching a huge murder of crows!
By the way, the collective noun for owls is a 'parliament', because owls are supposed to be wise and intelligent! Er ... I think in England at the moment this needs revising doesn't it?

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 16 Jul 22 - 05:28 AM

We've had rare visits to the bird station from a nuthatch and a female bullfinch in the last couple of days. A young fox has been mopping up the spilled bird food for the last week. Our cat and the fox just ignore each other.

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: keberoxu
Date: 16 Jul 22 - 12:21 PM

Now we have cicadas. They are the annual sort,
whose numbers are modest and who are rather private,
not about being seen.
They make themselves heard with the buzz,
but even the buzz is discreet-sounding.

A far cry from those periodic cicadas whose arrival
seems close to calamitous when they do come out of the ground.

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 17 Jul 22 - 07:25 AM

I once saw a male bullfinch in our garden. It was sort of like once seeing a yellow hammer round the back. I wish I'd seen more of them but they never stayed around.

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: keberoxu
Date: 30 Jul 22 - 07:10 PM

Rabbits have literally been thick on the ground this summer,
and guess what they are attracting here in the hinterlands?

Coyotes. I saw one streaking past me, black tail straight behind it,
in hard sunlight this afternoon.

I only hope that I don't have to watch
as a coyote catches and kills one of the furry little rabbits.
Or hear the rabbit's death shriek. Not fun.

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: keberoxu
Date: 03 Aug 22 - 08:56 PM

rabbits!
rabbits!!
rabbits!!!

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Senoufou
Date: 04 Aug 22 - 02:28 AM

Husband and I went to bingo last night in a village fairly nearby (Elsing). They'd opened all the doors and windows in their small village hall, and in the middle of the session a bloomin' partridge or pheasant (not sure which) started its loud, rasping call just outside the wide-open fire doors. The poor caller (an ex-RAF chap called Alan) tried manfully to carry on regardless:-
"Four and two, forty two."
"SQUAWK!"
"All the eights, eighty-eight."
"SQUAWK!"
Poor Alan, we all began to giggle and so did he.
One lady suggested that the poor bird actually had a winning Flyer sheet (very good pun eh?)

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: keberoxu
Date: 11 Aug 22 - 08:01 PM

And there are some Norwich Canaries
who are facing heaven knows what varmints!

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 11 Aug 22 - 08:13 PM

For only the second time in 35 years we've had hummingbird hawk moths in the garden, seemingly most interested in honeysuckle. Unfortunately, the heat and drought have nobbled the butterflies, except for those pesky cabbage whites.

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Senoufou
Date: 13 Aug 22 - 04:40 AM

Very true keberoxu! We live in hope that we'll win a few matches against the varmints!
Steve, we seem to have lots of cabbage white butterflies too. And as you say, the other types (peacock, tortoiseshell etc ) have vanished.
What we do also have in large numbers now is wasps. I don't myself mind them, but some of my neighbours are allergic to their stings.
I keep the two bird baths filled up with clean water, and the wasps, flies,and many other insects drink constantly from them, as well as the birds.
I feel I should put a flat tray of water out in the garden to help hedgehogs etc. (and probably rats, mice and so on, none of which bother me either)
Water? Water? What is this 'Water' eh? Soon we'll have forgotten what water is, unless it bloomin' rains soon.

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 13 Aug 22 - 05:23 AM

I have a birdbath on a stand about three feet off the ground but I've started to put out a large plant pot saucer of water on the ground too (it's about a foot across!)

There's not a blade of grass on my front lawn. Luckily, my spud crop was done and dusted (but not yet dug up - safer where it is!)) before the worst of the heat struck, and my large broad bean harvest is safely in the freezer. Except for Pelargoniums, which love dry heat, all the flowers are doing badly. Best just to keep tidying up, which includes mowing down those irritating stalky bits on the lawn.

No wasps here!

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Senoufou
Date: 13 Aug 22 - 12:41 PM

We had an actual swarm of wasps a few doors down the street. I often get wasps in the house, but I can't bring myself to kill them - I just gently wrap a thick tea towel round one as it buzzes on the net curtain, and pop it outside. Same with bluebottle flies - I rather like them and carefully help them to freedom.
My neighbour has a horrible fly-swatter, and thwacks any flying creature with it. Her walls are simply covered in the remains of squashed flies and wasps.
But spiders ... er ...EEEEEEEK!!!!!

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 13 Aug 22 - 07:17 PM

I'm the same. A couple of years ago we had a wasps' nest right over our front door porch and every arrival or departure was a running of the gauntlet. We had no option but to call in the local pest man. He got rid of our wasps, after two goes, and told us how much he hated killing things and was going to retire. He gave me four mole traps.

I have a half-acre garden in the middle of "unsympathetic farm-land." When we moved here 35 years ago it was just an open field. There were two beech trees, a couple of poplars (which we rapidly had removed) and a large apple tree. The beeches and apple are still there, but I've created a very diverse haven for both people and varmints. There are flowery areas near the house and around our two sitting-out places, my big veg plot with two greenhouses, hedges and shelter belts (mainly native elm) all around and several wild areas around the outside left to brambles and nettles, the latter around the edges and judiciously hidden from view. I've made a mini-orchard area around the original apple trees. Other than trying to control slugs, and fighting black spot on my roses, I rarely need to resort to pesticides. That was not the case when we started out. I've concluded that as wide a diversity as you can manage, preferably embracing native species, will mean that you can garden without pesticides and attract all your local wildlife. And why not!

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Senoufou
Date: 14 Aug 22 - 02:39 AM

Oh Steve, that sounds absolutely idyllic! And very similar to our last house, with an acre of garden beside farmer's fields, with only a shallow ditch separating it. I too used to let wild weeds/plants thrive in one corner to encourage bees etc. And despite the molehills (which my ride-on mower flattened back down) we loved it all. We had fallow deer crossing the ditch and stretching up to eat the blossom from the fruit trees (it used to be an orchard apparently) and foxes, badgers, bats, all sorts of delightful creatures arrived often.
You're quite right, nature sorts itself out, and leaving it in peace keeps a balance in a garden.
However, I sold the property eventually and we bought this little bungalow in a nice village. I feel less isolated, and village life is very pleasant. There are muntjac deer around, a lovely red kite soaring in the sky and the local beekeeper sometimes has swarms which clump in people's gardens and he collects them up with a skep and a smoker.
I do like 'varmints', living things fascinate me. I just wish I could conquer this arachnophobia. and now that my husband lives elsewhere, I must cope with the brutes by myself. Gulp!

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Aug 22 - 07:04 AM

You may help to lessen your aversion to spiders if you get up close and personal to the ones outside. Orb web spiders are quite beautiful close up and they're not going to get you, and I like looking at those little khaki garden spiders that dash around on the soil in me veg plot. I think that part of the issue with indoor spiders is the shock of suddenly seeing one in the sink or bath, or scurrying across the carpet. Several UK spiders can nip you, but never badly, and I rationalised away my fear of spiders by telling myself that the fact I'll be eaten alive by horse flies every time I go outside in summer doesn't stop me from venturing out!

I've just ordered a pamphlet guide to UK house and garden spiders for £3.30 from Amazon (amusingly, written by a bloke called Lawrence Bee). I'll let you know!

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Senoufou
Date: 14 Aug 22 - 10:24 AM

You're right again there Steve. I'm trying hard to see any size of spider as a living creature with the right to be around. I must pull up my 'big girl's pants', grab the nice soft 'tickling stick' duster (it has a long handle) to encourage the spider gently to get on board so I can pop it out of an open window. Spiders don't kill humans (only tropical ones,many of which I've seen in West Africa).
I've already posted on Mudcat about the new business that's opened in Nowhere Lane near our village, where one can hold a massive spider, or watch one in an enclosure. Many different insects and arachnids are on show, and one pays a bit extra to enter the 'Holding Room'.
I really don't agree with killing anything living now, especially not because of a stupid phobia.

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 16 Aug 22 - 11:46 AM

Talking about pulling up pants, I was putting on my boxer shorts after my shower this morning (down, girls...) when a vast arachnid fell out of them and scuttled away across the bedroom floor. The moral? Give 'em a good shake before inserting the legs...

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Senoufou
Date: 16 Aug 22 - 12:35 PM

Haaaghaaaghaaagh Steve! If I found a spider in my knickers as I was putting them on, I'd run outside in the nuddy screaming for help!

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Senoufou
Date: 18 Aug 22 - 03:20 AM

Yesterday I saw three hummingbird hawk moths hovering around my white Valerian flowers. (The only plants not dried-up-and-dead in my garden)
Very interesting insects.

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: keberoxu
Date: 30 Oct 22 - 03:43 PM

A television report said last night that
Boston, Massachusetts
is one of the most rat-infested cities in the nation.

Is it because it is an ocean port?
Don't rats favor watery port places?

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Feb 23 - 08:54 PM

We've been visited every early evening for at least eight or nine months by a beautiful dog fox. We've seen him grow in that time from a scrawny cub to a big fellow with a lovely coat. All right, confession time, I've been encouraging him every evening with either a small stack of peanuts or a handful of doggie-pellets. He and our cat come campaigning every evening for food together, and to my delight they ignore each other, even though they could be just a couple of feet apart at the back door. He'll come within a couple of feet of me, and I talk to him and he knows me, but that's close enough for me. He's a wild animal and I want him to stay that way. I'm glad that his doggie snack gives him a few vitamins and minerals, but he has to go and get the bulk of his diet all by himself. Ever since he appeared on the scene we haven't seen a single one of those hateful grey squirrels or a mole, and the pesky rabbits and wood pigeons have been much thinner on the ground. That'll do me! What joy!

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: keberoxu
Date: 16 Feb 23 - 06:17 PM

The other day, outside the window,
a large bird settled into a distant tree.
Don't know what it was, but it was bigger than the crows --
and the crows went ape-shit,
circling in the air and shrieking,
and flying away from that particular tree.
Wish I knew what the bird was.

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Senoufou
Date: 07 Mar 23 - 12:58 PM

Today we were worried about a large seagull that was trapped on the TV aerial of the house behind our back garden. It was desperately struggling to free itself. But as we anxiously watched, the Fire Brigade arrived, and two men put up two ladders, crawled onto the house roof and managed to gently free the creature. They handed it to an RSPCA chap, who wrapped it in a blanket and took it away in his van. Wasn't that wonderful that people were prepared to go out of their way to help it?

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 Mar 23 - 01:36 PM

We once found an oiled cormorant on the beach. We were standing there wondering what to do when a woman handed me a large beach towel, asked me to carry the bird to the top of the beach (about a mile away!) and disappeared - she wanted the bird helped but was too scared to handle it herself!

Anyway, I managed to wrap the bird (after several attempts) with just its head sticking out and gripped the rest of its wrapped body very tightly.

But what a head. It writhed and wriggled and gradually freed more and more neck until it was able to attempt some vicious whiplashing in the direction of my face. And I dunno whether you've noticed, but cormorants have a very nasty downturned hook on the end of their beak... That was a tough half-hour!

I got it to the top and the lifesaving club found me a strong cardboard box. We got the beast to the vet in town and, as far as I know, it got cleaned up and lived happily ever after...

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 Mar 23 - 07:20 PM

And don't talk to me about having a bat in your bedroom...

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Senoufou
Date: 08 Mar 23 - 01:37 AM

Oh Steve, in our last house we often had pipistrelle bats tangled up in the net curtains! Luckily, I'm not afraid of bats (only spiders).
The chap who owns the house where the seagull was trapped on the roof sent me an update this morning. Apparently, the bird was ringed, and the ring had got caught on a prong of the TV aerial. The RSPCA had to amputate its badly-injured leg, but said that many seagulls can manage on one leg. I think ringing them is a bit dodgy if it causes these mishaps.

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Senoufou
Date: 26 Mar 23 - 10:56 AM

Mr and Mrs Quackie, the two mallard ducks, waddled across the road this morning to visit me. And while I was walking back from the Village Hall coffee morning on Wednesday, the two Mad Swans were on the pavement, eating some grass growing by the wayside. I walked very close to them, and they seemed happy to see me!
Plus, a pig and some sheep have got out of Mr Barrett's field. They're roaming around the village now. We all wish Mr Barrett would mend his fences.

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: keberoxu
Date: 06 May 23 - 10:50 AM

I ran over an opossum the other night.
I was driving home from chorus rehearsal.
And the stupid opossum sauntered out into the road,
right in front of my auto, and stood there staring.
It was not possible to swerve on this occasion.
So I contributed to the local roadkill.
I don't feel good about it.

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 May 23 - 05:11 PM

The fox I mentioned ten months ago visits every day without fail. I can't say that he and our cat are best buddies but there's no stress between them and they largely ignore each other. He gets a daily snack of small dog food, not too much. He's very polite and waits patiently, head cocked slightly, until I produce the goods. It's all very charming. He won't come closer to me than about three yards, which I like. I prefer him to be a wild animal. Occasionally he turns up when I'm doing the gardening and he just finds a cosy spot in the grass close by to watch me from. He's in great condition and I find the whole situation to be a delight. He's called Basil, by the way, as in Brush. However, he'll forever be Baz to us...

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Senoufou
Date: 07 May 23 - 02:15 AM

Aw Steve, that is so kind of you. I bet Basil likes you very much. In our last house (set in a huge plot of land bordering on fields) we had a similar foxy chap come up to our patio doors and peer in. Like you, I gave him some cat food, and he got quite accustomed to our presence.
He never attacked our five (!!) cats. He was a very bright orange colour, extremely handsome.

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 May 23 - 05:02 AM

I understand that fox attacks on cats are very rare. I'm thinking that the average fox wouldn't want his good looks spoiled by cat claws! I also wonder whether there isn't an element of pecking order going on as well. The cat and fox commonly roll up together at teatime, the cat campaigning by pawing at the back door while he waits patiently a few feet away behind. He sees that the cat is allowed in, a much more privileged situation than he's allowed to enjoy, she comes when called and gets patted, etc., unlike him. "He knows his place," sort of thing. Or maybe I'm just talking daft...

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: keberoxu
Date: 14 Jul 23 - 07:09 PM

The rabbits are out and about, and they are hungry.
So hungry that at twilight they will come out and feed
with humans only a foot or two away,
and provided you stay still, they go right on feeding.

There was a barely-bigger-than-baby rabbit today
feasting on dandelion leaves.
He didn't like it when the school bus pulled up at the nearby intersection
with its loud screechy brakes.
He also didn't like it when I moved my arms.
He ran under the steps to the front of the residence.
He'll be back.

Subject: RE: BS: Varmints
From: keberoxu
Date: 21 Jul 23 - 09:33 AM

I narrowly avoided running my car into a bear.
It was a little bear, more legs than anything else,
and it was loitering on the shoulder of the highway,
getting ready to saunter across.

Then the bear saw my car coming and went,
Oops, changed my mind! and swerved away into the brush.