More Musings on Vermin

I ended up trapping four black rats, one male the first night, and three females over two more nights. They were identical to the male in appearance but slightly smaller. Then the trap remained empty for about a week even though I baited it each night with delicious, fresh vegan offerings. The depredations on Beast's sprouting grass seeds and my compost bin seem to be at an end for now.

I have recently tackled a new vermin problem: yellow jackets. The bastards are out in force in the PNW during this very dry summer. Archie is normally a fearless little fox terrier, but he is absolutely turned to jelly by yellow jackets ever since he was attacked by a swarm of them. They are so numerous that they are covering my hummingbird feeder ports and driving the birds away too. Time to reduce their numbers, at least locally.

Here is a picture of one of my traps taken this morning. I put this trap out, freshly baited, about 24 hours before this photo was taken.

Here is a picture of the trap taken just a few minutes ago. The blurry bits in the pic are more soon-to-be victims. The bodies mount up and it is so satisfying. Not quite the same level of satisfying as climbing into a freshly made bed, but very, very close.