So true!

LOL Sandi! That is one funny raccoon!

We're serving up won tons tonight since he was so picky last night.

not serious, I hope. Fragrant fruit -- apple, pear, cantaloupe-- cut in small pieces are the best bait. With wontons, you may find me in your trap tomorrow! Along with a whole bunch of cats.

We don't have cats, because we have coyotes who eat cats. We used cantaloupe one night and they ignored it. Maybe we won't catch the other one for a while, but I'm not giving up. I'm on a mission! I put a chair against my patio cabinet to keep him out. I have a tiny greenhouse on the side of our game room. They gnawed through a window screen and got into birdseed I thought was hidden from view. They are bad boys, bad boys.

When I make wontons, I make a lot. They make such a mess, I only want to do it a few times. I can give the raccoon a few as a send off to his new happy home with fountain and trees and $600,000. lots!

Yes, I've always felt trapped animals should move up in the world when relocated!

Lucky raccoons with wontons and $600,000 lots. Ours get only a bit of apple and whatever they can find on the Colorado River or Pecan Bayou. Now I am hungry for Chinese and there is none anywhere around. On serious diet anyway.

Sandi..If it was eating your fish then your fish food........why not bait the trap with some tuna or catfood (fish variety)....might work. Good luck tonight anyway!

No raccoon, but the won tons are gone. Sheila, if I used tuna, then we'd have to eat the rest of the can . The raccoons that live around here will eat just about anything. Popcorn, chicken bones, steak fat, anything that has an odor to draw them. We occasionally catch a possum too. Never caught a cat, tho. We don't set the trap unless we've had "pond damage." I guess one day a representative of the Wildlife Habitat folks will show up and demand my certification be turned in. I'll have to point out that I feed half of my front yard to most of the deer in the Barton Creek greenbelt. That should account for something!

You guys are making me laugh! Skunk story is so funny! Sandy, I am sure you will outsmart that raccoon eventually!

Today we attended a funeral for an old neighbor. His wife died a couple of years ago and then he got sick and died. The funeral was upbeat with funny stories of things he and his wife had done in their youth. He had had to have many blood transfusions toward the end of his life, and as a loyal UT Longhorn, made the nurses promise there was no Aggie blood mixed into his blood. At the end of a quirky eulogy and the reciting of the Lord's Prayer, the loud speaker in the chapel blared the Eyes of Texas just as had happened at his wife's funeral. Abruptly it was over and all of us neighbors were milling around. There was no after service reception, so some of us decided to go out to a restaurant and visit.

Things I learned while there:

There's now a havelina that runs behind the fences in the greenbelt and tears up the ground.
One neighbor has a screech owl couple in her owl house with babies.
Her neighbor has a hoot owl that isn't afraid of strangers in her yard.
The coyotes are creeping closer to the middle of the block and not staying in the greenbelt any longer.
One neighbor actually saw a ....raccoon! Really?

Wow Sandi, I can thankfully say I haven't see the coyotes on our street yet. I'd love to see the owls though! I remember all the barn owls we used to see at my grandparents' farms.

I had to look up a havelina. YUCK. I'll stick with the dillos and the skunks thanks!

Hope you didn't share with them that you are certified...they may be relocating animals to your house if so!
Great that the neighbors got to spend some time together. Makes you a better neighbor when you know those that live around you. I do hope the little twerp ball roller's dad didn't come!

javelina are delicious....if cleaned & prepared properly.....as are armadillos.....I'd pass on coyote & skunk.....unless I was REAL hungry

No Sheila, Twerp's dad maintains a low profile. We have great neighbors. It's one of the reasons we stayed here instead of building another house. We have a chili cook-off at the end of October every year. Three celebrate birthdays in Sept. (including DH), so we either have dinner and cake in one's home or go out together. Oops! Back on topic!!!

We're going to go up the street to see the owls this evening. We have to be escorted so we don't scare 'em, so we're told! I think I'd like to have an owl house. I hear the Screech owls in the fall in early morning dark when I go out to get the paper. Seems like they call to each other. Kind of eery. Wonder if they eat raccoons?

Armadillos can carry leprosy.

Sheila_FW said:Hope you didn't share with them that you are certified...they may be relocating animals to your house if so!
Great that the neighbors got to spend some time together. Makes you a better neighbor when you know those that live around you. I do hope the little twerp ball roller's dad didn't come!

well said!

Sandi I don't think the screech owls do as I recollect, they are pretty small. Not too long ago there was some territorial fighting between some big 'ol hoot owls over the neighborhood chimneys and THEY were big enough to grab a raccoon. (Raccoons and skunks can carry rabies)

I know it's off-topic, but I love the idea of neighborhood get-togethers! We've had a couple in the past and know most of the people on our street, but a few houses have changed hands recently. I think it would be great to plan a chili cook-off. Thanks for the idea!

At the lake, there have been numerous rabid skunks this past year. No idea why. That's one reason we weren't so thrilled to find we had a family of them living under the deck/house.

(As for chili cook-off, some that don't want to cook chili bring cakes and cookies or side dishes. It always works out that there's plenty of food. There's a cul-de-sac at the end of our street and it's set up there. Extension cords run from a couple of the houses to the tables where the crock pots sit. We carry our chairs, chili, and a cooler...plus our next door neighbors' stuff in "Elizabeth," my big garden wagon, and walk down. A few neighbors insist on lighting fire pits, but the smoke is awful. The cook-off winner gets a banner to display in the front yard. Our neighborhood has lots of walkers, so we keep up with each other that way too).

The getting together sounds so fun; but ....right now neither chilli, fire pit, and especially the thought of being outside sounds the least bit tempting in Texas!! But we are all praying that fall will come one day!!