I have a problem. When I closed on my house almost two years ago, the previous owner advised me that there was a woodchuck (or if you’re from Philadelphia, a “groundhog”) living under the shed in my back yard. I didn’t really think much of it until Kelly and I got married and I inherited a glorified cat as a pet (Roxy the Shih Tzu).
Fast forward a year: somehow the woodchuck has morphed into 5 woodchucks, and the initial woodchuck has doubled in size so that I am now able to put a saddle on him and ride him around my apple tree. If you don’t know, woodchucks can be mean. At my parents farm in Northwestern PA, they’re all over the place and one once attacked and bit the crap out of my mom’s 45 pound English Setter. Now you see my concern: if 10 pound Roxy got between a woodchuck and its hole, I’d have an inconsolable wife to console.
Things have come to a head, and I began brainstorming plans to take care of problem. Here’s what I came up with:
1) Shoot the woodchucks. This is what we do up at my parents’ farm, normally by removing the screen from a window on the second floor and raining lead on them from above. Unfortunately I live in a residential area where that sort of thing is frowned upon, which leads me to option 2:
2) Buy a silencer for my handgun and go Vincent Vega on them. Unfortunately, silencers are illegal so this wasn’t a real option, but it was fun to think about for a few minutes.
3) Call animal control to have them removed. Probably the most humane option, but also the most costly. Being a frugal kid, I nixed this idea pretty quickly.
4) Get a trap, catch them, and release them at a nearby park. Also a humane option, but it would entail transporting disgusting, smelly woodchucks in my nice clean car. Probably not going to happen.
5) Get a trap, catch them, and drown them in a garbage can full of water. This is sounding good, but the only issue could arise if my already excessively nosy neighbors see me and call the Cruelty to Animals Tree-hugger Society. A definite option.
6) Have my father-in-law sit in a nearby tree with his bow and take them down. I thought this would be good because if he hit them and didn’t kill them, the woodchucks would at least be unable to reenter their hole because of the arrow sticking out the side of them, allowing me ample time to walk over and whack them with a shovel. However, the idea of my father-in-law in a tree in the back yard hurling around broadpoint arrows with little kids next door probably would draw undue attention.
So which route did I go? Tune in to Part II to find out!
Plastic explosives are unfortunately not an option for me
Technorati Tags: woodchuck, groundhog, exterminate
