" EMPTY NESTERS "

This last week was a busy week trying to figure out who our new family members were or better yet.... what they were.

I was home alone one day last week only to hear such a strange noise. A noise that caught my attention. This noise sounded like someone grunting or coughing and then a loud moving around sound. I stood still trying to figure out did I have a visitor that would surprise me out of my skin as I entered another room. You might know...all noises disappeared.

Later in the evening, I hear that coughing/grunting sound. This time I go to tell my husband...we have someone or something living with us. We both stood quietly listening for another sound. Oh yes...we got one, and then another and another. Scratching and a lot of movement noises. As we figured the damper to be closed to the fireplace we took to the thinking...whatever it is will go out the same way it came in. Really ???

Another day comes and goes and by this time it is weekend. And at last we finally received summer in Indiana. Indiana summers can be quite hot and humid. Such as it goes the ole hot humid weather of 93 degrees with heat index of 102 degrees kicked in just in time to put off the worst odor anyone could imagine in their home. My husband says " don't tell me that thing died ". I said "oh no..I hear it scratching & moving around".

I started calling for ANY animal rescue to come fast. After many calls, I finally get a man that was giving me lessons on raccoons as my impatient husband in the back ground says...just ask him " can he come NOW ". Trust me...that day I knew God was watching over us !! Just so happens that man was in our town on another call, not raccoons but a snake rescue.

As the rescue man arrives so does my little grandson " Little C ". "Little C" heard about Grandma's raccoon on his way to our house, but as he sees the rescue man he didn't know which was worse. This man had a long beard and "Little C" is scared of men and long beards. So, he says " I am not going in ".

The rescue man looks up in our fireplace only to see looking back at him a litter of coons. I think this man was so proud of himself as he diagnosed our problem. He then says, I am not going to try and pull them out but I will put a male raccoon scent up in the damper and this will run the mother and her litter out and away. We thought..that simple ? No, not really, we have another fireplace. He told us that the mother raccoon would just move her litter to our other fireplace chimney so he had to put the male raccoon scent up into that damper too. He said to just give the ole mother coon some time and she would move her litter to another home.

As this story goes...by Sunday evening we had a new definition of "EMPTY NESTERS". And we have never been happier to be "EMPTY NESTERS" !!

Now to the lesson I was receiving on raccoons. A mother raccoon and her litter don't like the scent of a male raccoon because a male raccoon is very aggressive and if he isn't the father of the litter, he kills the litter. So, this is why a raccoon rescuer uses male raccoon scent. The mother raccoon moves her litter to another home. And as we live in town not the country, these are "city coons".

As far as the rescue call on the snake... no snake yet, so he set a trap.

What's next...chimney caps !!

Until We Meet Again ....
CROSS STITCH WOMAN