Subject: Varmint Terror 101
Date: Feb 26 22:02:08 2004
From: Hilary - habarnes at earthlink.net


Enjoyed your urban wildlife anecdote (and so did my third-grader, a good
little birder and nature story fan). This incident caused us to recall our
own noteworthy experience of suburban marauding mammals:

We looked outside into my Bellevue (Factoria/lower Somerset), side yard one
morning in mid May, two years ago, to find our cast iron Shepard's crook
hanger bent down to the ground, and the hummingbird feeder nowhere in sight.
My initial thought was that it must have taken a humongous raccoon to bend
a steel rod like that. On inspection, the iron pole was muddy, but only on
the top part, which seemed odd. We then discovered the feeder- unscrewed
from the base, empty of nectar, and tossed into the bushes. The thistle
feeder had been opened and emptied, as well. We were still thinking raccoon
rampage at this point, although we'd known them to nest in an old tree near
our deck without causing any real problems before.

However, on comparing notes with the next-door neighbor, we found that they
had had a visitation as well- and had called the police to follow up on it.
They had been joined for breakfast at 5 am by college-age black bear of
suspect background, who had a little pizza party at the trash can by their
kitchen. I don't know what they expected the police to do- issue a citation?
This bear became a general nuisance in the area, was eventually detained
without being charged, and subsequently deported.

Our immediate reaction was "bearanoia" - we cut off the hummingbirds and
finches immediately, only resuming feeding recently as a kind of
"anti-depressant" measure for us. I would like to run a worm box or food
digester, but am concerned about creating an attractive nuisance. I wouldn't
want the party bears to cross paths with, say my potential son-in-law or
other late night creature. Needless to say, we have learned to be leery of
leaving goodies lying around between May and November. So- just a note of
caution- although there should be no undue concern right now- we have even
larger potential problem children cruising the greenbelts, waiting to
commit "crimes of opportunity" if we make things too tempting.

We live on a ravine over the Coal Creek Parkway, where a mother of two cubs
was struck by a car a year or so ago- not seriously hurt, though. We host
gourmet deer as well. These are not picky eaters, and apparently have
refined tastes- they dine fine on local yuppie landscaping choices,
including many items on their Sunset "restricted foods " list (apparently
not required reading). They also do a lot of what might be generously called
"severe heading back." Bad Bambi! There is no point in trying to grow
veggies or cutting flowers. Thank gosh for Hellebores- I know, there are no
true native Hellebores here - so, lash me to the feeder pole during bear
season....

Hilary Barnes
Bellevue, WA
habarnes at earthlink.net