Fuzz Tailed Varmints

My granddad used to sit on his front porch and hand feed squirrels. I loved to watch him feed them and I began to think of squirrels as cute little pet like animals. When I became a homeowner in Bartlesville, Oklahoma, my opinion of them changed drastically and I began to think of them as fuzz tailed varmints. Here’s the story.

Fuzz Tailed Varmints

 

In 1996, the squirrel count in our neighborhood had gotten completely out of hand. The pesky bush tails were chewing holes in the wood trim on our homes and getting into our attic and throwing the insulation out the holes. They had even chewed a hole in the side of my house and got in the area between the upstairs and downstairs just above our bed and kept us up all night. Then they chewed the electrical wire apart to the light in our shower. That was the last straw, I officially declared war on the squirrels. I patched all the holes I could find, but the bush tails just chewed new and bigger holes right next to them. Next, I bought the largest rat traps I could find and placed them baited with nuts at or near all the entry ways. I never caught a single squirrel. I did some research and found an article that advised squirrels hated the smell of moth balls, so I put them everywhere. Still had bush tailed rodents in the attic.

 

By now, I was getting desperate, I read about some hi frequency sound devices you plug in to a 120 volt socket that was guaranteed to keep all rodents away. I bought some at Atwoods and plugged in several inside and outside the house. The bush tails just continued to run wild. They seemed to be laughing at me with their chattering.

 

Next, I bought me a red rider B B gun and set up a blind on our patio. I baited the area with sunflower seeds and waited for the fuzz tails to show up. The B B ‘s just bounced off of their tough hides. I made a sling shot with surgical rubber and a forked stick so I could shoot a handful of B B’s at the same time. Same results. I was afraid to use a pellet gun in the neighborhood so I nixed that idea. Poison had also occurred to me, but we had too many pets in the area to risk that.

 

I went back to Atwoods and bought a varmint trap, baited it with sunflower seeds and set in on the concrete wall on my patio. After two or three trapped bush tails got away by shaking the trap and knocking it off the wall, I weighted the trap down with a large rock and I started catching the fuzz tailed nut crackers. I had to decide how to dispose of them, so I looked around and found an isolated patch of woods surrounded by prairie on all sides to haul them to about 8 miles out of town I figured any attempt to get back to town would result in a squirrel dinner for a hawk, an owl, a coyote or a dog. I started keeping records of the squirrels I trapped and hauled to the place we eventually started calling “squirrelville”. In three years, I trapped and hauled 282 fuzz tails to squirrelville. I never really solved the problem with the varmints in the neighborhood area, but we learned to live with it. Along the way I also trapped and hauled a 20 pound raccoon and two opossum.

 

I’ve noticed lately that the fuzz tails have grown in numbers again, so I been thinking about starting Squirrel War II.

Let’s go get in Bills attic and drive him crazy.

All you Fuzz Tailed Varmints, come and get it, Dinners ready.

Thank you for reading Fuzz Tailed Varmints,

Hawg Jaw Bill