Last week I noticed another woodchuck had taken up residence in the lawn. I'm partly to blame, since I had neglected to dig up the burrow left by the one I trapped a few weeks back. He must have wandered here and thought "Sweet! A yard full of clover AND a furnished appartment to boot!"
I finally had a free morning yesterday, so I baited the trap with an apple and set it in the same location where I'd caught the previous tenant. It took longer this time, but a little after noon, I went back to check the trap and found it occupied.
This 'chuck was too large to have stood up in the cage and plaintively laid his paw against the bar like the last one I caught. His body actually spread across most of the width of the cage. He wasn't nearly as timid as my last catch either. When I approached the cage he scowled at me and clicked his teeth loudly. When I picked up the trap, he lunged at the hatch and pushed one side of it out nearly an inch. I was not looking forward to a ten mile drive with this animal. After I'd put him in the car, I covered the trap with a blanket, which seemed to calm him, and he moved very little once we got on the road.
As it happened, I had an appointment in Brighton yesterday afternoon, so I made a slight detour on the way there and liberated the 'chuck on some state land. I'm hoping that between now and the beginning of their hibernation season in October, I don't have to send him a neighbor.
Tags: Nature; Animals
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