sweasel.com

Sounds like a Harry Potter chapter title. The Cat, Badger and Weasel.

Oh goody, a weaselotter to look at. This has not been a good week for visuals. Pelosi all over the net, Hillary with a bozo button a couple of days back and the then the LSD Bambi Kinkaid thing. Hillary is only bearable by imagining her under real sniper fire. And that Kinkaid thing works by pretending just off screen is Dick Cheney on a dinosaur equipped with rocket launchers (thanks to Frank J). I was starting to consider finding a braille version of the internets.

Perhaps you could sketch us a wee drawing of the puir beastie, telling the story to his family.

You don’t kill ’em? Seriously? Catch and release doesn’t work with Al Qaeda, and it doesn’t work with vermin (but I repeat myself).

Many moons ago, when I lived Oop North, I was billeted in a grotty terraced house adjacent to an empty property. I had meeses. Oh boy did I have meeses. The place was heaving. So I bought two dozen mousetraps and placed them along skirting boards throughout the joint. Every one was filled with a small furry corpse by sun-up. Rinse (literally) and repeat. I charged through the ranks of those little bastards like a man possessed. The death toll was probably a hundred within the first fortnight. But I solved my rodent problem. Attrition works when the casualty figures are so lopsided (this is another thing mice have in common with Al Qaeda). You have to be ruthless. One bold traveller ran along the bedstead while I was sat up reading one night. I nailed him with the heel of the right hand shoe from a pair of hand-lasted brogues. He – no kidding – exploded. I mean blood and bone and tripes and grey matter in a cartoonish circle. I mopped him up, and slept the sleep of the just, safe in the knowledge of a job well done.

Incidentally, when it comes to baiting a mousetrap, cheese is about as much use as a soap hacksaw. It dries out, it’s hard to attach to the trigger plate, and mice just plain don’t care for it much. I did an IT consulting job for a pest control guy and he turned me onto the number one mouse attractant: peanut butter. They cannot resist it. If you can get the variety with a bit of Nutella mixed in, even better. It’s like cider to a piss-head.

I have to agree with David Gillies on the efficacy of peanut butter as mousetrap bait. It was the only thing we used on the farm where I grew up. We did have cats both inside and out, but there were places where the cats were not allowed and we kept a few traps baited with peanut butter in the backs of the cupboards as mice would occasionally come in from outside. The best thing about peanut butter is the mice couldn’t just snatch it and run, but had to sit there licking it. Even the most tightly stuck trap would eventually snap on the mouse as it sat there. One time a trap had two mice! I held the bag for my mother to scoop the trap into and we then cremated the creatures, trap and all.

Oliver, my declawed and 18 pound cat has presented a dead rabbit on my doorway each of the last two days. I’m not quite sure how he is doing it, as he has trouble just walking around. He ignores the cage of 14 mice I have, which are the most interesting of all the critters that congregate in my home.

No, no. We put out lethal snap-traps ordinarily. I can’t say as that’s much fun, but I understand the necessity.

This was kind of a special case. I’d chased this beasty around the living room for two hours before I got it trapped in a pot. I slid a piece of cardboard under it and hustled it outside. I suppose I could’ve tried to step on the little bastard after I whipped the pot away, but I doubt I’d’ve got him.

After two hours of watching him pant in terror, we kind of had a relationship, y’know?

Umm (or should I say ‘erm’)
I forgot to say how much I like the sleek figurine, regardless of its species.

Speaking of the Gods.

Deus ex Machina

OK, so I’m a hyperdweeb. Ha! Finding new science outside of science. Me luvs it.

Caption: “If you would only spare my life, I would be sure to repay your kindness.”

The kids are out purchasing a black mouse to go with the 14 white ones I already have because they saw your pic! (Keeping the guys and girls separate, I hope!

Ha! You’re welcome. My favorites are always agouti! I guess because I got interested in the wild mice that semi-tamed themselves around the farm. Some of the little bastards seem to be born with no fear.

I like mice. I kept them for years. I finally quit when I got sick of the frequent and horrible ways they die. Life really shits on rodents.

Working in a lab with mice in college, the “humane way” to get rid of them was the worst. It didn’t bother me though, and I’m an animal lover all around. Mice have a life curve of about two years and they all die within weeks of each other when kept in captivity. Interesting critters for sure. I’ll post a pic of “Blackie” soon.

This “catch and release” adventure reminds me of one of my all-time favorite stories – “Squirrel Cop”. It’s on this podcast from NPR’s This American Life. The theme of the stories is “First-Day-On-the-Job”. The Squirrel Cop story is the second…. and so it starts at 19:50 seconds… It’s (IMHO) worth a listen. Just open the link and move forward to the 19:50 mark….

Squirrel Cop

“I like mice. I kept them for years. I finally quit when I got sick of the frequent and horrible ways they die. Life really shits on rodents.”

But they do have a lot of sex right?

Mine didn’t. I only bred a litter once. The rest of the time, I kept them sex-segregated.

That litter was hella fun, though. I have video around here somewhere showing the nine little furheads growing up.

Lamest excuse I ever gave for missing work: my mouse gave birth this morning!