Chippies

[jenks]

I am seeking the advice of others who have fought the war and won. I have been invaded in my workshop by a lone, cunning, and wiley chipmunk. He has snubbed his nose at me and laughed at my attempts to bait him into the havahart trap with apples and crunchy peanut butter. He has scowled at my rat traps baited with similar offerings.

I have a theory I would like to put before others: If I take a bottle that is with an opening that is similar in size to that of a chipmunks forebody, and put ample seed inside the bottle, would it not make sense that the chipmunk will enter the bottle and fill his greedy pouches with seed plentiful enough that he will then not be able to exit the bottle? He will not shed the seed to exit, as it would mean leaving his bounty behind, and he won't ingest the seed to get out, as his instinct is to forage and stash the seed in his hiding place (which I will have to eventually locate).

I have left the garage door open for hours, I have done most everything else I can think of, but at this point he has bunkered in and I will not play landlord to a family of wannabe rodents. Any and all thoughts on the theroem and other helpful suggestions would be much appreciated. I want my house back.

[Mrleft8]

Move your shop... You won't win.

[jenks]

The garage is clean, I just moved into it, earlier this fall. The shop is really my garage that is attached to the house. I was working in the yard and while I had the garage door up, he made a mad dash inside. I didn't notice him residing in there until I had bought some suet blocks for my feeder and he located them hanging off a set of shelves. He chewed his way into the back and found a stash of bird seed in there as well. I have since relocated these in pickle barrels with screw on lids so he can't go back to the well and get some more. Now it's just one lone chippie and me going head to head. I have kept the garage door down since then and parked on the drive. He's not getting in or out, and if I can do this right he will leave in a small black body bag.

[oldriverat]

You're a meanie. What's wrong with a little Chipmonk? I got one that lives under the front steps of the house. He's cuter than a bugs ear.

[jenks]

Livin' under the front steps is one thing, but living in the house is another, especially come spring when he brings home that ner' do well female that might propagate up to seven little ones that will find their way into other areas of the house. No, I have to make an example of him to the others who stand outside the house in the yard waiting to see if he will exit in a victory dance. I have caught myself daydreamin' of an Elizabethian skewer for impaling in the front garden that will announce to all the others 'don't mess with this guy.' I have toyed with the idea that the right amount of voltage might not be a bad thing to introduce to his cardiology. I have things in there that I don't want him nesting in (i.e., seasonal camping gear).

[Mrleft8]

Just invite Jack over.... He can take it out to the country and drop it off near a farm where it will enjoy a long and happy life frolicking with the children, and the farmer's wife will feed it table scraps and make a bed for it in the sheep pen.... :D

[jenks]

I've got to catch him first and that's where I need the suggestions.

[Bob Smalser]

Got any access to coumadin blood thinner from a friend taking it?

Dissolve a few tablets in water then soak some shelled sunflower seeds in it and dry them....or maybe Chemist is monitoring and has a better way.

Put a pan of water near it's access runs...they get real thirsty before they die that way and you've a better chance of it not dying in your walls somewhere.

[Bruce Hooke]

Unless he's got some way of getting in and out, and assuming you have removed any potential food sources, he is going to get hungry real soon and be quite eager to vacate the premises in a hurry at the first opportunity. So, unless you are determined to kill him I would just open the garage door and keep on eye on it until he departs. There is no way that he is going to raise a family in the garage without any food source. Furthermore, other chipmunks are not going to learn a thing from coming across a dead chipmunk. I would inspect things carefully to make sure that he does not have another way in and out of the garage -- and remember, he can probably fit through a very small hole, so, for example, unless the garage door fits very closely all around he may be able to squeeze around it at the ends. If he does have other ways in and out then you can pretty much count of various critters taking up residence.

I don't think the bottle with a small mouth idea will work. First off, getting the size just right would be very hard, second, I think the critters are smart enough to drop some food if they have to get through an opening (remember, they spend a lot of their life crawling around in small spaces), and third I have my doubts about whether, even when stuffed with food, their mouth area would be the largest part of their body...

[Meerkat]

coumadin -> cumin derivative.

Mike, you got a chipmonk under the car? Where does the fish friar live? tongue.gif

[Nicholas Carey]

One word: cat

http://www.lovekisshugs.com/gifs/smokeypaws.jpg

Even if the cat doesn't take out the little chipmunk, it'll convince the chipmunk that it should find more hospitable quarters for the winter.

[martin schulz]

Crap - I thought this was about the best Chippie in the UK. I hoped that Andrew would gladly jump in and tell me where I will get the best cod&chips.

Ok then, again it's trial and error in the next UK vacation.

Ehh, Jenks. Chipmonks aren't those those cute animals that sing such horrible songs on christmas?

[jenks]

Thanks everyone, for those suggestions offered. He may have his food stocks set, as it was two to three days before I caught on he was there. In that time he had hauled away one quarter of a bag of bird seed. I have removed all other food options at this point, but know he has some reserves. I will continue to work with the live trap, which he squeaked through the one end yesterday. It is an older version of a Havahart, and didn't close off completely. He may not come back to it though as he has a negative association with it now. It's a brick house with a sound exterior all the way around. Leaving the garage door open is certainly an option to get him out, but I have not been here consistently enough to warrant being able to do that, and I don't want to do that when I am not here. I do have a dog (Choc. Lab) but doubt the Chippie will be concerned that the dog can find it and get to it, considering there is a workbench, rolling toolbox and other things to hide behind or underneath. Cats are not a interest in my life at this point, left that behind elsewhere, if you know what I mean. Thank you one and all, I will try to come back and post a response on the outcome of the 'hunt.' I am off the first three days of next week, so time through the weekend and beyond will be my advantage.

[ 11-05-2003, 06:58 AM: Message edited by: jenks ]

[Bob Smalser]

Tis winter...he won't refuse more food....PostIt Note ads notwithstanding, they never find half of the stuff they hide.

[Donn]

It's a garage, right? Pull the car in, shut the garage door, and leave the car running.

[Ron Williamson]

In a word,Warfarin.
We HAD chips and field mice in the crawl space.Two open packs in strategic places,end of story.
R

[jenks]

Talked to a old farmer today that told me he had a five gallon bucket in the back of his shed that was catching the rainwater from a leak in the roof, and when he went into get the bucket he had about ten mice floating on the surface. He said that the wall studs were within reach of the edge of the bucket and the mice fell in and drowned. Other mice came along and catching the scent of the earlier mice they went in to canabalize. I have set up another trap along these lines with some field corn leading up a board to the edge of the five gallon bucket with about one gallon of water in the bucket. Floating on the surface is a small butter lid with some field corn laying on the lid. Chippie will work his way up the board and go in for a swim. In the meantime I have no other water source in the garage and he's been in there for about four days straight, with no moisture except for the apple slices I had baited the havahart trap with, so he should be thirsty. Will have to wait and see.

[Barnacle Pete]

get a gallon of gas, pour it on the kitchen floor and light a match......

[jenks]

:D VICTORY! I bidded my time, I waited and gave him a virtual playground of options to select from. Although I didn't rebait the Havahart since he was familiar with it, I did locate some cumadin and ground it up really fine with some rolled oats and with a little creamy peanut butter made some marble size balls that I rolled around in some cracked corn and baked slightly in the oven at 200 degrees. Then I lay them out in the garage in a spot next to some water.

All of that preparation and sitting back to wait for him to venture out and guess where I found him tonight. In the new fangled plastic rat trap that was baited with crunchy peanut butter. His only thoughts were likely to have been, "'Man, this guy really has a thing for peanut butter.'" He did sample half of what I had put out that was baited. So if he hadn't been greedy and gone for the trap, he may have succumbed to the cumadin.

I have my garage back, I have my garage back, I have my garage back!

[Meerkat]

http://www.eagle.ca/~diane/Chipmunk1S.jpg

Poor Chipmunk. :(

[ 11-18-2003, 07:30 PM: Message edited by: Meerkat ]

[Bob Smalser]

It's ok, Steve...we environmental terrorists need to stick together.

BTW...noticed somebody mentioned Warfarin rat poison...Warfarin is cumadin.

[jenks]

From what I had read on Chipmunks, they have a finicky taste and are real particular about what they will go after. If I had used regular poisons, the sources I read on-line indicated that Chipmunks might gather and take it back to their stash, but they wouldn't necessarily eat it if they had other food stores that were more in line with their typical foods.
They would turn to it if they fell on hard times with food stocks running low, and would eat it then, but I didn't know how long I could wait him out on that.

So that's why from what they explained you want to go for foods that were more perishable and that they wouldn't want to forestall on eating. That's why I went to using peanut butter and other options that were foods he might not wait on eating.

Taking him out was not my first choice, but he became too wiley for the Havahart, and I knew that with colder temps here in Ohio moving in, I might not get more clear chances to catch him. I also need to get into the garage and start building a bed for my daughter, and one for myself after that, along with some bookshelves. Having moved into this place in August, I need to get more settled in, and projects abound. I'd much rather be getting some plans for a boat set up to build, or be working on a new rudder for my swampscott dory, but household obligations are pressing harder.

I want to extend a hugh smile.gif and debt of gratitude to those who offered advice and humor to keep me on my toes. I was getting a little concerned that this was going to get out of control before spring arrived, and didn't want to get a multifamily housing complex going in my single family dwelling. So thanks to all, and rest assured, I gave him a respectful resting place that was befitting his manner of lifestyle.