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Sunday, August 2, 2009

941. the inhumane humane mouse trapper

i really have a thing about killing animals.
so much so that i still toil to get those freakin' flying squirrels out of the attic alive.
so much so that i have been using a humane mouse trap for over three years now with great catch and release success.
in fact, i think i've caught and released the same mouse about fifty times—i can tell because he snickers that little mouse snick every time i release him.
but at least he's alive.

well he ain't snickering anymore let me tell you.

i killed him and i killed him bad.
the lesson learned: check the so-called humane trap, a nice little box with a pleasant air filled holding area, daily, if it's armed, with or without cheese, in position or not.

or be prepared to discover a little house of mouse horrors.

such was the case an hour ago when keaton came in from the living room suggesting that i might want to check the mouse trap because there was "an odor".
i know "the odor".
for anyone owning the conventional, neck snapping mouse trap, you know "the odor" too.
that's how i know "the odor".
i killed many with those primitive tools in my less enlightened years.
bob's dark ages.
but i was done with "the odor" ever since keaton showed me the error of my neanderthal ways and she bought me this little, so-called humane number for christmas.

that is until and hour ago.

i hadn't check the damn thing in a week, but i had plenty of reasons why not to.
first, it's summer and any mouse worth it's salt is suppose to be outdoors and enjoying the earth's bounty.
second, the trap had no cheese in it.
third, it was on it's side, meaning "not in use! no cheese today!".
fourth, i checked it last week after a month or two and found nothing, as any normal human would have expected.

that is until an hour ago.

there was no mistaking i had done something in, as i searched through the dotted air holes, about the size of "o" actually, and noticed a dark shadow that had no business being there.
apprehensively, i took the device outdoors to inspect the damage.
possibly it was still alive, barely, but alive just the same.

oh, this was very bad.
i will not sleep well the next several weeks.
i had trapped two vermin, not one as best i could tell.
one plump and stiff, it's little nose pushed through an air hole as far as it could go.
the other ...
the other ... well ... a furry shell of itself really.
eaten down to it's intestine.
i had captured hannibal mouster and some unsuspecting mousey meal.

if someone were to ask me what would be the most inhumane way to kill a mouse, i would not have thought of this as a possibility.
unwittingly, i would have come up with something quite civil by comparison.

that is until an hour ago.

2 comments:

Pam said...

Yummy, mouse meat! One of my favorites. Especially when freshly snatched and popped into the mouth. ~Bear cat

Couldn't resist.

itsmecissy said...

tsk, tsk, tsk (you had to know that was coming).