Rat Patrol, Other Adventures, & Grease

My battle with rats went full bore last week. It began on Monday. And it began with a bit of introspection as I waited for the sun to rise so I could get to work. I don't like killing things – usually.  Over the years of living here in rural Potter County, I've come to accept the necessity of terminating the lives of certain creatures. I kill them if they pose a threat to my garden, my trees, my flock, my house. But even then, I usually feel a pang of regret, even if it is a very tiny one. I can admire the beauty of things like Japanese beetles and lily beetles, but slaughter them while admiring them. With all the things I kill, I tell myself that I only do it because they invaded my domain and caused a problem. If there is a non-lethal solution, I embrace it. I've live trapped and released many possums and skunks. My biggest enemies, in terms of size, are rodents. Mice, rats, voles, and woodchucks to be precise. I'd rather not shoot a woodchuck. When I see them out in other places, I actually like them. They are fun to watch. But they can destroy a garden in a matter of hours, and so I shoot them when they come onto our property. We have very pretty mice here, the White-footed Deer Mouse (Peromyscus leucopus) and we kill them all the time, but I always feel a little sad and find myself reciting Robert Burns' "Wee, sleekit, cowrin, tim'rous beastie" as I dispose of their little corpses. We have a lot of Eastern Meadow Voles (Microtus pennsylvanicus). They are a destructive pest in my garden and orchard and I kill them at every encounter if I can, but they are also pretty little things. There are no poems written about them. And that brings me to the worst of the rodents, rats.

Before setting out to wage war against them, I pondered on rats that morning. These are not native animals. They are Norway rats (Rattus norvegicus), also called Brown Rats, and Barn Rats. Oddly, they did not originate in Norway. That name came from a false assumption back in the heyday of assigning binomial nomenclature in the 18th century. They actually originated in China, but they have spread across the entire world via shipping. They have an interesting history of their involvement with humankind. They were blamed for carrying the Bubonic Plague that killed millions of people, but more recent research indicates they didn't play as big a role in that as once thought. But they do carry diseases. Most people find them repulsive. We had pet rats when I was a teenager. They were Hooded Rats (Rattus norvegicus domesticus), and they were fun pets, very smart. They went to school and to church with us sometimes and always created a sensation. The rats in my barn, however get no sympathy. I feel no regret in killing them. I do find them repulsive. We trap them, poison them, and shoot them. We get a rat invasion in the barn from time to time. The year we kept pigs in the barn, we had a major infestation. Most years, they try to move in, we kill them, they go away for a while. This has been a bad year.

Rattus norvegicus and Rattus norvegicus domesticus.

While reflecting on rats, I remembered a television show we liked back in the late 60s called The Rat Patrol. It was about a group of soldiers in World War II fighting in the desert in North Africa against Nazi Field Marshal Rommel. There were a lot of good World War II based television shows back then – McHale's Navy, Combat, Twelve O'clock High, Hogan's Heroes – and we watched them all. But I digress. When I was a new Boy Scout, we needed to make a new patrol for the younger group I was a part of. We were asked to come up with a name for our patrol. There were other patrols with names like Wolf Patrol, and Bear Patrol. My group chose Rat Patrol. I was assigned to make a flag. My mother sewed an orange flag with a big red rat on it. I think I still have it stashed away in a box somewhere.

So back to Monday morning. It was time to take major action. There was a huge network of rat tunnels under the coop floor. I set out to destroy them. As soon as the chickens were up and out in their yard, I went into the barn and locked them out. Kurt had delivered the rototiller to the barn the Saturday before. I cleared everything off the coop floor and started the tiller. It wasn't easy navigating the tiller in such a confined area. I worked at it most of the day. I went back and forth, churning up the floor.  I decided that while I was doing major work, I might as well tear out the middle pen in the coop so I could till that too. That's where I keep my young birds until they are big enough to join the flock. It was a slapped together sort of thing made of bits and pieces of various fences held together with wire and nails. It wasn't very effective at keeping the small birds in and the predators out. So I took it all down and trashed it. I'll build a new, more secure pen before my new chicks arrive in May. Then I tilled that floor too.

Debris from the torn out chick pen.

The tilled up coop and no chick pen.

I was very tired at the end of the day. Tilling is very strenuous work. After dinner, I took a slow walk around the property. It was a perfect spring evening. We'd had a brief rain a little earlier and everything was washed clean. It smelled so good. The trees in the meadow and the woodland garden are starting to leaf out now. In the orchard, many of the trees are starting to bud. As I walked, I checked every tree. It looks like I might have lost two of my smallest apple trees over the winter. Or they might just be late sleepers. I felt refreshed after my walk, but still tired. I went to bed early.

On my evening walk out in the big garden.

Apple buds.

On my evening walk.

Tuesday morning was beautiful. It had rained during the night and the world was sparkling. I spent part of the morning down in the chicken coop building a perch to replace one I removed the day before. It was in front of their nesting boxes and I took it out thinking the chickens could just fly up to the boxes, but I was wrong. My fat hens couldn't handle that and they started laying their eggs on the ground. So I built another perch. After that, I did more work in the woodshed. I tidied the end of it where we keep the tool box and other often used things. I love to bring order to chaos.

The tidied tool end of the woodshed.

The rest of the day was spent doing what I normally do – weeding. The weather was perfect – warm sunny, and breezy. It was a joy to work in the dirt. Around 4:00 a thunderstorm blew in, but I was done working by then, so I didn't mind. It wasn't severe, just a bit of rumbling and a good drenching rain for an hour or two. After the storm, as the sun was setting, there was a rainbow.

Sunset on Tuesday, a rainbow to the east.

Sunset on Tuesday, storm clouds to the west.

On Wednesday morning there was a brief bit of color at sunrise and then another thunderstorm rolled through. It only lasted half an hour. After the storm, I went out to do the chores and take a walk. Spring has advanced to the point where things are growing quickly. The world is greening. It is new and fresh and lovely, and, unfortunately, very vulnerable. More about that later.

Sunrise before the storm on Wednesday.

I spent the entire day out in the garden. It was a perfect day. As fine an April day as I have ever known. Toward evening we had another thunderstorm. The thunder and lightning passed, but the rain kept on through the night. It was warm. I slept with the window open so I could smell the rain and listen to the peepers. Perfect.

Thursday morning was warm and foggy. The world was still dripping from the night's rain. After the sun finally broke through, it was beautiful, glittering and clean. I spent an hour in the woodshed planting a tray of tomato seed – five seeds each of ten different varieties. Then I spent the rest of the day out in the garden. As I worked, the soil was warm in my hands. In the beds where I planted lettuce and spinach seeds last week, I found the first sprouts. All day there was a brown thrasher singing its random, rambling song from the thicket across the road. I couldn't believe that with all that warmth and bright sunshine, that I had to worry. The forecast said there was cold snap coming on Sunday and Monday and all of it might be lost.

We left on Friday morning to go down to the Thayn's for the weekend. Hazel, June, and Mabel were in a production of the musical Grease and we went to see them. Miriam went down early on Wednesday evening. She helps with the production's hair and makeup and needed to be there for their dress rehearsal on Thursday. We went via a circuitous route to get there on Friday. Stacey wanted to visit a few famous places en route. 

Our first stop was the Boyer Candy Company in Altoona. One of the sweet delights going way back into my early childhood was indulging in a Boyer Mallo Cup. The Mallo Cup, a confection made of a whipped coconut-marshmallow center in a milk chocolate shell, was invented in 1936 by Bill and Bob Boyer. The Boyer brothers started their company during the Great Depression. I can't eat that sort of thing anymore, but it was fun to visit the place where it is made. We spent some time in the outlet store and bought a selection of treats to share.

The Boyer Candy Company, Altoona, PA.

Our second destination was the Horseshoe Curve near Altoona. The Horseshoe Curve is a National Historical Landmark and a National Historic Civil Engineering Landmark. It is a 2,375 foot long curve in the railroad line that runs between Philadelphia and Pittsburgh. For every 100 feet, the tracks bend nine degrees to form a curve totaling 220 degrees. It was finished in 1854 and was a marvel of engineering for its time. It has special significance in our family. My great-grandfather, Samuel Adam Showers, was a mail clerk on the Pennsylvania Railroad in the early 20th century. He rode the train from Harrisburg to Pittsburgh, sorting and delivering mail to the stations along the way. He traveled the Horseshoe Curve many times and often spoke of it to my mother when she was a girl. When riding the train through the Horseshoe Curve, you can see the front of the train from the back of the train. In 1983, after staying with my grandparents for a month, I rode back from Harrisburg to Los Angeles on the train and went through the Horseshoe Curve. And in 1985, Stacey, baby Geoffrey, and I rode the train to and from Los Angeles to Harrisburg and went around the curve both ways.

The Horseshoe Curve, not my photo.

Our last stop on our way to the Thayn's was the Johnstown Flood National Memorial in Johnstown. On Friday, May 31, 1889, the South Fork Dam on the Little Conemaugh River, 14 miles upstream from Johnstown, broke. It released 14.55 million cubic meters of water that flooded down into Johnstown and killed 2,208 people and caused half a billion dollars in damage. The memorial, run by the National Park Service has an impressive display and video showing the aftermath of the disaster. It was quite moving to see it and realize the scope of the tragedy.

One of the displays.

A photo of the town after the flood.

We finally arrived at the Thayn's house at 4:15. The Fosters had arrived on Thursday. Kale and her children arrived shortly after we did. Now we were all there and the party ramped up. Some of us went to the play that evening. I was with the group that stayed home. We just sat around and played games and visited.

Saturday morning began with a birthday breakfast. Mila and Mabel both had birthdays to celebrate. Mila's was on the 17th, Mabel's is on the 21st. We had a donut tower and bagels, and lots of presents.

Mabel at the birthday breakfast.

The birthday girls.

The big event of the day was attending the performance of Grease. Hazel, June, and Mabel were great in it. Hazel had a bigger part in it and even sang a little solo. June and Mabel were in the ensemble and were in several dance numbers. Their costumes and hairdos were great. It was a fun performance.

Greased Lighting.

Hazel is the middle singer in the trio.

Beauty School Drop Out.

After the performance.

We'd planned to stay another day and go to church with the Thayns, but their meetings were canceled because of a plumbing problem in their building, so Stacey and I decided to come home after the play. Hannah and Miriam stayed the extra day and will be home later today.

We got back at 7:30 yesterday evening. We drove through heavy rain most of the way. We unloaded the car and unpacked and by then the day was done. Driving south on Friday, it was interesting to see spring advance. At our house there were a few spring flowers. As we descended to lower elevations, there were Juneberry trees in bloom, then forsythias. Further on there were redbuds and dogwood. Then there were maples and other trees with their tiny new leaves and fruit trees in bloom. Coming home, the process reversed. The temperatures have been so mild, but that is about to change.  When we arrived home yesterday evening, I found my big plant order waiting for me on the front porch – fruit trees, asparagus roots, bare root strawberry and raspberry plants, and gladiolus bulbs. 

The big order all in one large box.

The weather is raw today, cold and windy enough to be miserable. When we came out of church it was trying to snow. It's not cold enough for it to stick – yet. Later tonight it will be. Tonight and tomorrow night we're supposed to drop into the 20s. That could spell disaster for a lot of the garden. I'll cover the lilies. The apples aren't budded out enough for it to be problem, I think. But the lilacs are probably doomed. The warmth last week coaxed their tiny flower buds to emerge. I have lots of good work to look forward to in the week ahead. As soon as this cold snap passes, I'll be planting those new trees, strawberries, and raspberries. And I'll be praying that we are finally done with winter – but you never know.