Elmer, I misunderstood you 02.05.08
UNTIL recently I never had
much time for Elmer Fudd. I know that it sounds
widiculous that I’d be cheering for the crazy talking
animals over the human, but there you go, I was.
And so any time Bugs Bunny tried to outsmart the little
guy, I would be laughin’ my head off.
In fact now that I think about it, he often made it a
two for one, because in many episodes Bugs would not
only outsmart poor oul Elmer, he’d do it at the expense
of Daffy Duck. And yes, I’ll admit it, I thought that
was funny too.
But I don’t know why. I mean I like ducks. Well, okay, I
like duck, especially with some orange sauce or in one
of those pancake thingys you get in the Chinese
restaurant.
My attitude towards rabbits however, has changed
dramatically over the past number of months.
You see a rabbit has decided that he would very much
like access to my garden and not |
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content with the fact that
he can easily run through the gaps in the bottom of the
fence, he has been digging huge holes in my lawn.
When it came at the start it prompted all sorts of “ah
look at the wee cute rabbit” kinda talk from my family
but they now agree that enough is enough and this
digging is going to have to stop.
The problem is, I have no idea how I’m going to manage
to do that.
Initially I thought it would be simple. I filled the
hole in with huge stones, covered it back up with claw
and planted a few grass seeds on top to prompt growth on
the bare patch on the lawn.
But this didn’t deter the rabbit who next time he was
travelling along the burrow realised he’d need to take a
detour when he hit rock. So he did. And then another
hole appeared in the garden not far from where the first
was.
So I filled it too. Same thing happened. It’s like
something you’d see in a cartoon, except the period of
time involved is much, much longer so when you think
about it, as a cartoon it would be pretty boring.
In desperation I turned to the font of all knowledge in
relation to such matters – Google.
The first suggested answer I got to the problem was one
I have to admit I had thought about.
“Try a .22 rifle, they won’t dig much after that,” said
the reply. Were it not for the fact that I am not the
biggest gun fan, it might have tempted me. And so the
search went on.
And then there seemed to be the answer. It was stuff
that you shake on the ground and it just scared the
rabbits away. Why, well apparently, and this is
according to the web site that sells it, rabbits are
afraid of it because it smells of fox pee.
Yep, their sensitive noses can sense if their enemy is
near and they’ll be too afraid to come out, the site
suggested. Umm, I wondered. In this situation am I not
an enemy? Surely I could adapt that theory slightly. |
It was a thought that
lasted all of two seconds, I mean, what would the
neighbours think if they were to see me peein under the
tree in the garden.
Anyway considering the tenacity this rabbit has shown
over recent months, I wasn’t convinced this shake on
stuff would work. This rabbit is, I convinced myself,
pretty unique.
So I sat down and thought long and hard. How do you
catch a unique rabbit?
Simple really – Unique up on it.
(Oh and if you want to catch a tame rabbit...tame way!) |
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A DROP OF
PORTER is
the weekly
column of
Inishowen
Independent
editor,
Liam Porter. |
|
