The retirees in my neighborhood bask in empty-nester status. Run our errands, complete our volunteer work, visit the grandkids by videocall, check to see what we can stream on TV.
We’ve regularly endured the deer that munch on the hostas that Mary has nurtured, as if she were catering to them with a garden salad. Moles have burrowed into the lawn and left little runways in the grass. Field mice have looked for an entry crack into the house each fall when the weather cools.
The most noticeable wildlife can be seen during the day. The woodchuck that set up a den 50 yards away under a neighbor’s utility shed seems harmless. He suns himself occasionally but scurries under shelter whenever a lawn mower enters the common expanse of green backyards.
However, he has become Public Enemy No. 1, the Al Capone to my Eliot Ness, the gopher to my Carl Spackler. The whole neighborhood is ballooning into a Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom. This saga began simply enough when the woodchuck became a migrant.
My neighbors, Felipe and Vicky, who pride themselves on their flowers and plantings, noticed a small depression alongside their deck. They didn’t give it much thought and continued their meticulous weeding and watering. Then the shocker occurred. The large fury rodent was no longer the boy next door; he was popping in and out of the hole under their deck. Perhaps he’d eat all their flowers. His digging might destabilize the deck. Even worse, he might start a family.
I told them it would be wise to invest in a BB gun. A few pellets in the butt – I can imagine the wildlife lovers cringing already – would drive the woodchuck away. That worked for my friend when at least two Canada geese, known for their prodigious pooping, tried to take up residence in the serene duck pond in front of his house.
The woodchuck disappeared for a time and soon was out of sight, out of mind. Vicky and Felipe had other issues. Last week, Felipe noticed a baby fox cowering under the bushes in front of his porch. Could there be more? When Felipe came back later to check, the baby had left. Phew.
We were reviewing all this animal activity during a visit across the yards when Vicky asked if he we heard a tremendous screeching noise around 2 or 3 a.m. that lasted for about five minutes during a recent night.
“It sounded like someone was torturing a cat,’’ she said. “It was clear as day, and loud.’’
The next day I chatted with neighbors Jon and Dave, who occupy adjacent homes across the street. Dave suggested that a fox might have eaten four baby bunnies who were nesting in his yard.
“That was no bunny screaming,’’ Jon interjected. “That noise was two foxes in my backyard. They were mating. There’s nothing subtle about them. They screech.’’
Mystery solved. A screeching fox orgasm seems like nothing to him. He and his two dogs have been through the wringer.
First, Jon was conducting a 5 a.m. walk at a defunct golf course, where the dogs can run off their leashes, when one took off for the bushes. One dog tangled with a skunk, who sprayed both. Jon drove home with the windows down, mixed a concoction of dish soap, baking soda and vinegar, then labored to bathe both dogs and quell the odor. When he arrived at work, his colleagues held their noses until the boss sent him home. The skunk spray was that potent.
A few weeks later, he experienced Skunk vs. Dog II in his own backyard. More baths, more persistent odors.
“I was so over it at that point,’’ Jon admitted. “It’s frustrating.’’
But wait, there’s more. He has a woodchuck living in his backyard too. He has made several attempts to drive it away, including dumping dog feces down the suspected den hole under his forsythia bush and urinating in the hole. No report on whether either worked.
I was still chuckling when I returned home, until I spotted the woodchuck basking in the sun.
“You should go out there and scare him away,’’ Mary said.
So I did. Horrors!
He ran under a bush near our deck and disappeared. Upon further review, I found the entry hole he dug. It seems we were empty-nesters no longer.
I announced I would try Jon’s urine strategy but my board of directors scoffed.
“You can’t be out after dark peeing into the hole,’’ Mary chided. “You’re a 67-year-old man. That would be embarrassing.’’
Hmmn. Thank God she never attended one of my college rugby parties.
So I resorted to online counseling. One video suggested that dryer sheets, when ramrodded down woodchuck holes, served as an effective deterrent. The rodents vacate. I tried that. No decision yet on whether everything you see online is true.
Upon returning from a weekend road trip, my neighbor Felipe texted me, as if we were communicating by radio on the front lines of a war.
“Ooohhh, that pesky groundhog,’’ Felipe wrote. “I saw him go under the fence into the backyard where Sharon and Wayne used to live.’’
Maybe he left my premises. Perhaps this little varmint is a gigolo groundhog, with a lover in every yard?
Within a day, we confirmed his virility. Mary spied a family of four young woodchucks sunning themselves near the neighbor’s utility shed. It could be a long summer.
“How much wood could a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood?’’ I hope I never have to find out.
Morristown native Jim Holleran is a retired teacher and sports editor from Rochester. Reach him at jimholleran29@gmail.com or view past columns under “Reflections of River Rat’’ at https://hollerangetsitwrite.com/blog/
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