Yates Lake Topics: Cute little things - right !
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Name:
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PikeSki
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Subject:
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Cute little things - right !
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Date:
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6/14/2006 11:24:11 AM
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Just wanted to pass this information along to any of you who may need it in the future:
Please Note - I'm not trying to stir up any arguments on animal rights or anything. I'm just passing along a story and some information that I found shall we say . . . useful.
THE STORY:
I had a cute little pair of chipmunks running around the outside of my house late last year. I left them alone to root and forage to their little hearts content. Live and let live right? We all got along fine. . . for a while.
Well, long story short. I found through research that Chipmunks multiply 7 times faster than rabbits. I can confirm this now that it's spring. I have them running around everywhere. They dug a couple of soda can sized holes in a garden next to the carport. Well within a few weeks there were 4-5 holes under the carport. I thought I would get them to 're-locate' to another area by plugging their little holes with rocks and cans (soda cans fit nicely into their holes). Well apparently they liked their current home so they simply dug more holes around the cans.
The problem here is simple. They are digging their holes under a structural load bearing column the supports the roof of my house. Due to them digging under this column and removing all the dirt our car port slab is now starting to crack right along the column. This changes my viewpoint of "cute little chipmunks" to "public enemy number one".
REASEARCH:
I found through research on the Internet that chipmunks cause tremendous amounts of damage to homes every year. Once they get inside your house the can remove insulation from walls, run around at night (always over your bedroom of course) and can also burn your house to the ground. One of their favorite tricks is to tear the insulation off wiring in your walls to take back to their nests for their youngins. Apparently this is quite cozy for them. The problem here is that you now have bare exposed wires in your walls and should they touch . . . . You better call the fire department. . . . fast.
They can also clog up your dryer exhaust port with the insulation that they no longer need causing your dryer to catch fire when you turn it on since the heat can no longer escape the exhaust port.
Remember, Chimpunks are rats with racing stripes. No more . . . no less.
THE SOLUTION:
I found that traps and poisons (and gasoline, fire crackers, and bottle rockets) don't really work that well. A BB gun (or other) is OK if you have days on end to sit and watch for the little critters. So here's a trick I learned that is quite simple (and nearly free), and works quite well.
Take a 5-gallon bucket and fill it half way with water. Set it in the location of where the chipmunks hang out. Take a 3-4 ft. long 2x4 and place one end on the ground and the other end up on the rim of the bucket (you see where I'm going here). You then need to take a couple of sunflower seeds (non roasted or salted) and place a small trail up the 2x4. Then you need to pour sunflower seeds in the bucket (they float) until the top of the water is covered.
Here's how it works. The munks climb up the 2x4 eating the couple of sunflower seeds teasers you placed there. They then look into the bucket and see all of the good stuff they just ate (which to them looks like solid ground and isn't so deep that they can't jump out of the bucket in case a predator shows up). They jump down onto the seeds thinking it’s solid ground and into the water. The water is too deep for them to jump off the bottom and out of the bucket and the water isn't deep enough for them to grab the rim of the bucket and pull themselves out. After some time, they shall we say . . . expire. The neat thing here is that when chipmunks die they float just below the water level causing the sunflower seeds to cover them up in preparation for the next little guy that decides to "walk the plank".
So if you have Chip and Dale's cousins running around your house, you should build them a little chipmunk pool like I did. It works great and you can collect 2-3 per day.
The next topic will be "101 ways to broil, deep fry, bake, and BBQ chipmunk" but that's for another day . . .
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