Althouse: "A sign at a playground in Moraga, a 35-minute drive from San Francisco, advises parents that rattlesnakes are 'important members of the natural community' and to give the snakes 'respect.'"

February 7, 2022

"A sign at a playground in Moraga, a 35-minute drive from San Francisco, advises parents that rattlesnakes are 'important members of the natural community' and to give the snakes 'respect.'"

"Across the Bay in the San Francisco suburb of Burlingame, an animal shelter has rescued a family of skunks from a construction hole, a chameleon from power lines and nursed back to health 100 baby squirrels that tumbled out of their nests after their trees got trimmed. With the exception of the occasional aggressive coyote, the animals that roam the hills and gullies of the Bay Area — turkeys, mountain lions, deer, bobcats, foxes and the rest of a veritable Noah’s Ark — find themselves on somewhat laissez-faire terms with the humans around them. Not so for the rampaging feral pigs...."

From "The Rampaging Pigs of the San Francisco Bay Area/A proposed California law would make it easier to hunt feral swine, the voracious “super invaders” that are the bane of some East Bay suburbs" (NYT).

60 comments:

Achilles said...: The Fall of Rome as a how to guide.; 2/7/22, 11:37 AM
Lloyd W. Robertson said...: There's something funny about all the re-wilding efforts, although I'm sure it's not funny if a young child faces a feral pig. I also gather that in many cases responsible people say re-wilding is simply going to happen, there is no escape. Coyotes are a notorious example, along with (I guess) skunks, raccoons, mice, rats if they stay outdoors, snakes, etc.

I'm becoming obsessed with Los Angeles--maps, geography, history, local color in different neighbourhoods. Of course there are mountain lions there to some extent. I was surprised yet not surprised to find out there is some interest in re-introducing the grizzly bear that is on the state flag. It was ubiquitous in pioneer times, with animals tending to roam in packs. We're talking a specific sub-species, bigger than your average grizzly bear today. There are a few black bears in California, but they are unlikely to be found in urban areas. As part of the discussion, re-wilding advocates say the re-introduction of wolves in Yellowstone has gone OK. Maybe, except that there is supposed to be a strict line between park with no hunting, and surrounding ranchland where hunting is allowed. How would this work in SoCal or the Bay area, where at least until recently everyone wanted to live?; 2/7/22, 11:39 AM
Earnest Prole said...: I’ve seen coyotes, deer, and wild turkeys walking down my city (not suburban) streets in the East Bay, and I hope someday to see a mountain lion. A few years ago my brother-in-law encountered an eight-foot rattlesnake at UC Berkeley.

Feral pigs are like Canadian geese, eucalyptus trees, and scotch broom: unwelcome.; 2/7/22, 11:42 AM
Richard Dillman said...: When we lived in Eugene, Oregon, near Skinner’s Butte, during the dry Oregon summers, the rattlesnakes often visited our backyard, looking for water. They particularly liked our garden with its ample water supply. Needless to say, they terrified us. When I lived in Connecticut, we had a large nest of copperhead snakes in our backyard stonewall . We had to hire exterminators to eliminate them. No amount of utopian, green rhetoric is going to persuade me that these snakes were important members of my natural community. However, i am happy to include
garter snakes in my circle of friends.; 2/7/22, 11:43 AM
wendybar said...: Who knew Nancy, Diane, and Eric Swalwell were rampaging in San Francisco!! Seriously, with all the garbage, human feces, needles and filth in San Francisco, what did you expect would happen??; 2/7/22, 11:49 AM
Paddy O said...: Feral pig extermination has a successful recent history off the coast of California. I camped on that island not long before they started getting rid of them. Pig bones everywhere near the campsites. We used them for an ad hoc giant chess game.; 2/7/22, 11:56 AM
Paddy O said...: The friendly warning about snakes is a way to make parents aware of the danger without freaking out the kids; 2/7/22, 11:57 AM
PM said...: Woodside, CA, home of high-end techies, is using similar environmental language for a different purpose. It's declared itself a mountain lion sanctuary (wisely avoiding 'cougar sanctuary') in order to skirt CA SB9, a new law that encourages more housing by allowing lot splits. A woke NIMBY move that probably won't work.; 2/7/22, 12:02 PM
Paddy O said...: "We're talking a specific sub-species, bigger than your average grizzly bear today."

I was at the Santa Barbara natural history museum the other day and they had a stuffed California grizzly, which was a fair bit smaller than the average grizzly from up north. I didn't see if it was a juvenile. The blue whale out front is only 72 feet long and was
a younger not full grown whale.

The brown bears were introduced to SoCal in the 1930s, I think, they're not a native species to the area and were intended to replace the grizzlies with a smaller, less dangerous bear. They do venture into the suburbs near the foothills. Up where I live in the mountains, they know trash day and come by every Tuesday night to look through people's garbage. Had a mother and baby visiting our house for a while.; 2/7/22, 12:05 PM
MadisonMan said...: Respect is a two-way street, is what I say to rattlesnakes, as I brandish a shovel.; 2/7/22, 12:05 PM
JaimeRoberto said...: I grew up in one of the towns mentioned in the story and have hunted pigs in the hills in the area. Waiving the $25 pig tag won't make much of a difference when you need to pay a guide hundreds of dollars to hunt on the ranches and much of the habitat is owned by local water districts and off limits to people. And of course you can't hunt them in a residential neighborhood.

There definitely is more wildlife in the area than when I was growing up. We'd occasionally see a deer when I was a kid, but now there are turkey and deer every day and occasionally a coyote in the yard.; 2/7/22, 12:06 PM
Eleanor said...: Where I live is rural. There are no venomous snakes, but we have black bears, coyotes, fisher cats, and other animals in the neighborhood. The coyotes' habitat is a very large wooded area. A developer has leveled a large tract in the middle of it and is building some houses. I can hear the coyotes a little closer to me, but the area is still big enough to provide a habitat for them, and there are still plenty of smaller animals to provide them with food. So far they haven't moved into my yard. But they still use the open area in the middle to get from one side of their habitat to the other. Paths that will soon go through the yards of homes. I'm not sure I'd want to live there with a small dog.; 2/7/22, 12:08 PM
Indigo Red said...: Auburn, 100 or so miles east of SF, in the Sierra Nevada foothills. I live here with rattlers, turkeys, bears, mountain lions, bobcats, coyotes, deer, and much more. I have seen all of the critters. We will be adding wolves soon; they are migrating from Idaho and Wyoming. There is a wolf family in the far north of California spreading out into each member's territory. For the most part, people and wildlife keep to their own. One day, however, there will be blood. Small children will be hunted and eaten.; 2/7/22, 12:21 PM
Anthony said...: I am known for catch-and-releasing scorpions that find their way into the house (AZ). The coyotes mostly keep themselves to themselves. Our version of pig (javelina) do the same. Haven't seen a rattlesnake yet (save for a dead one), but I'll just give them a wide berth and leave them be.

And have caught-and-released various non-venomous snakes from the backyard.

I am a friend to all creatures. Except mosquitoes.; 2/7/22, 12:22 PM
Big Mike said...: It took a while to wriggle past the paywall. Feral pigs are dangerous and destructive animals, not least because they are quite smart. I have read reports from Texas about feral pigs invading a corn field and devastating the crop starting near the center of the field but leaving the edges of the field intact so the farmer doesn’t even know he has a problem until his crop has been effectively destroyed. And, yes, they will kill humans, especially helpless children.

This quote from the article bothered me:

Wayne Hsiung, the co-founder of Direct Action Everywhere, which describes itself as fiercely nonviolent, said his group is “very much opposed” to the culling of pigs, which he compared to killing dogs and cats.

Some people are impervious to reason and reality. And they seem to gravitate to California.

Also in the article is a suggestion that bringing in jaguars to eat the feral pigs might be a good idea. What they’d do if the jaguars find it easier to eat a farmer’s livestock or children on a playground than to tackle feral pigs with long, sharp tusks is not addressed.; 2/7/22, 12:23 PM
Lem Vibe Bandit said...: Pigs go where they find food.; 2/7/22, 12:26 PM
Xmas said...: Personally, I think hunting in CA should be limited to the same sort of firearms that where available when the 2nd amendment was ratified. Our founding fathers could clear a continent of megafauna with black powder weapons, there is no reason CA needs hunters with high powered assault weapons to murder innocent swine that escaped thier enslavement.; 2/7/22, 12:39 PM
Temujin said...: In SF they also give out needles to drug addicts, put outside urinals for homeless (which they don't use), and allow humans to crap in the streets along with the pigs, coyotes, bobcats, and chameleons(?). Fewer people work or want to work. Others just go into stores, clean off shelves into bags they brought with them, and walk out.

A few years ago I read a book called "The man who watched the world end". Basically it was about how humanity died out. Not with a bang, but with a silence. Humans became infertile, and as one last generation aged, with none coming up behind them, the book tells the tale of one man watching the end from his home. As the plants and animals took over the land- right down to the housing community he lived in.

In 2015 this was fiction. But that didn't take long. We're below replacement rate in population and continuing to drop. Our cities are being drawn down. The animals are coming back in packs. No one wants to work anymore. The best and brightest are being scorned and replaced by Blue Checkmarks. And our leaders are feckless, unintelligent mediocrities.

Nice world if you can keep it.; 2/7/22, 12:43 PM
JAORE said...: Lots of the pig hunters in Alabama (they are a growing problem here too) use the AR-15 platform to cut down the excess population.

I'm sure that solution will work a charm in ol' San Fran.; 2/7/22, 12:45 PM
Flat Tire said...: The wealthy community of Woodside above Silicon Valley is trying to have itself declared mountain lion habitat and sanctuary to avoid having to build affordable housing.; 2/7/22, 12:51 PM
rehajm said...: Our community attracts mostly residents who enjoy and appreciate wildlife. Some do shoot wildlife for the monthly photo contest and some appreciate the property was once a game camp and shoot wildlife for a freezer full of venison, or a disruptive pig.

I'm okay with the snakes. We had a multi-rattle monster crossing the road last summer. Everyone panics over copperheads. The bite is nasty but shouldn't end you. You need a bit of common sense and watch where you step, especially at night when you walk the dog. If nature picks off a few neighbors who don't have any of that, well, guess that's okay with me...; 2/7/22, 12:57 PM
rehajm said...: ...I'm having trouble with the family of mountain lions that keep showing up on the neighbor's nest cam at our new place, though...; 2/7/22, 12:58 PM
typingtalker said...: We have met the voracious "super invaders" and they are us.; 2/7/22, 1:06 PM
rcocean said...: Ferel pigs need to be erradicated. Not native, not good for the enviroment. As for rattlesnakes, we have enough in Congress. We don't need any in suburbs.; 2/7/22, 1:09 PM
Josephbleau said...: In a more natural world humans should re-create the primitive state of equality of predators. Becoming food for other creatures is probably the most impactful thing most people can contribute to Gaia. A wise man said, "Some days you eat the bear, and some days the bear eats you." This makes sense in the sharing between nature and man as a group. The individual involved is just a valued "Animal Ambassador" representing us all in the circle of life.; 2/7/22, 1:19 PM
Skeptical Voter said...: Ah Loyd W. Robertson---black bears in urban areas? We got 'em. The San Gabriel Mountains are the northern boundary of much of the Los Angeles area. And there are bears in those mountains and they do come down. Folks in Glendale, La Canada, Altadena, Monrovia etc do get "bear visits". One such bear made repeated trips down into Glendale/La Canada because he discovered discarded swedish meatballs in the trash. He liked them. He made so many trips down to raid trash cans that he became known as "Meatball". He'd get "relocated" back up into the mountains after each such foray. After the last such excursion the authorities sent him off down to an animal sanctuary in rural San Diego where he now lives in a cage with all the meatballs he can eat.

But videos of local bears disporting themselves in swimming pools in the foothills or walking across decks (there are a lot of security videocams and it's surprising what walks through the neighborhood at night) are common.

But these wild things can be useful in the human world. There's legislation in Sacramento forcing the construction of low income housing for the homeless (and voiding local zoning ordinances). One of the upscale suburbs in Silicon Valley has announced that it's now a "mountain lion sanctuary". Yup--they do have the occasional mountain lion. And if they can run the sanctuary scam, they hope to prevent those messy smelly homeless and low income people from getting shelter in their town.; 2/7/22, 1:19 PM
Krumhorn said...: I give rattlesnakes great respect. As a networking facilitator, I will inevitably introduce them to the blade of my shovel.

- Krumhorn
(my preferred adjectives: brilliant/awesome); 2/7/22, 1:36 PM
Dr Weevil said...: EP (11:42pm):
Since when are eucalyptus trees "unwelcome" at UC Berkeley? I haven't been there in ~42 years, but I distinctly recall the area of campus I visited a few times (Dwinelle Hall) had some huge eucalypti nearby and smelled like shaving cream. Other than being extremely flammable, eucalypti are way better than gingkos: in season, the sidewalk behind the main library at the University of Virginia smells like 10,000 dogs took a dump on that block.; 2/7/22, 1:39 PM
First Tenor said...: Growing up in Texas, I hunted Feral Hogs. They are mean and very territorial. They are aggressive and have very strong jaws. They will chase the unwary human up a tree and will patrol around it until something more interesting comes around.

They do mate for life, so if you kill one of a pair, it's best to kill the mate.; 2/7/22, 1:41 PM
retail lawyer said...: Moraga, or the county it is in, now includes the pronoun of the bureaucrat in a banner along with the sign language signer when a bureaucrat makes some statement for the local news.; 2/7/22, 1:54 PM
AZ Bob said...: When it comes to hunting wild boar, we should be more like France:

https://www.statista.com/statistics/1246326/number-wild-boar-killed-france/

The benefits are:

http://www.gourmetfly.com/Cookingwildboar.html; 2/7/22, 1:54 PM
Gravel said...: Richard Dillman - Copperheads in CT? I didn't think they lived that far north. *checks google, gets a little confirmation bias* Are you sure it was a copperhead? That quick search indicates that MA is as far north as they get.

I understand why people are leery of venomous snakes, although there is much less reason to fear most of them than many people think. And they're frequently mis-identified.; 2/7/22, 1:58 PM
retail lawyer said...: The re wilding thing is happening here on the SF Peninsula, and it is a problem for small pet owners. Coyotes laid a trap for my off leash German Shepherd and almost got him. I saw him running back to me at full speed with a pack of coyotes chasing him. Luckily, they peeled off as he got close to me, but it was very frightening. He also got into a fight with two raccoons in the backyard one night. He decisively won that fight, but was still bloodied and they knocked over a redwood table.; 2/7/22, 2:00 PM
Maynard said...: Here in the greater Tucson area, we have rattlesnakes, bobcats, javelinas, coyotes and deer that I run across on a regular basis. No issues there. We enjoyed seeing two bobcats lounge outside our backyard this Christmas.

Rattlers demand respect. I was hiking on a mountain trail last Summer when I was surprised by an angry rattler. Perhaps, I should say that the snake was surprised by my noisy trudging up the slope. I heard a hissing sound that the primitive part of my brain told me was danger. As I jumped backwards, I noticed a large coiled rattler less than 10 feet ahead. It was quite the adrenaline rush.; 2/7/22, 2:09 PM
John henry said...: I learned a lot about how problematic feral pigs can be from Neal Stephenson's new book Termination Shock.

They are really nasty, dangerous beasts. Once they get a foothold almost impossible to get rid of. In the book they crash the queen of Holland's plane, nearly killing her.

First non-scifi book since ReamDe and as good as anything else he has done. His last 5-6 books really sucked. He's just not good at sci-fi

John LGBTQBNY Henry; 2/7/22, 2:13 PM
JPS said...: I was walking the dogs in a neighborhood I'd moved to only a few months earlier, and we came across a copperhead killed on the road. Impressive, except for the mangled mess up front. Big fella, with a beautiful pattern. I hadn't known we had to worry about them away from creeks and such. I told my kids about looking out for them, where they can catch you by surprise.

I was pleasantly surprised to read they'll usually bite once without injecting venom, and if you don't back off it's the second bite you have to worry about. Not that I think the warning would do my larger dog much good, she'd decide that first bite meant war.

I know they can be dangerous. If I have to choose between an animal life and human, I'll protect the human, of course. (Richard Dillman, a large nest in the backyard wall is probably more risk than I'd want to tolerate over the long term.) Where reasonably possible, I prefer to follow the Army's pragmatic advice: "Just don't fuck with the wildlife."; 2/7/22, 2:19 PM
BUMBLE BEE said...: Pigs will eat anything and anyone. Tusks are scalpels. God makes a lot of em, have at it but use enough gun.; 2/7/22, 2:23 PM
mikee said...: The females and tiny pigs taste great. The males, even if butchered immediately upon death, taste rank. Once again, females & children hardest hit.; 2/7/22, 2:24 PM
Wilbur said...: The snakes, the pigs, the skunks, the baby squirrels, the coyote, the animals that roam the hills and gullies of the Bay Area — turkeys, mountain lions, deer, bobcats, foxes ... everyone in this article is incredibly annoying.; 2/7/22, 3:29 PM
StephenFearby said...: Politically correct view from San Francisco.

NYT comment, which (not surprisingly), has garnered 47 "likes":

Arabella
SF Feb.2

"This article is deeply imbalanced, striking me as persuasive rather than informative, inciting readers to mobilize for battle. The author seems to relish in repetitive descriptions of the pigs’ wanton destruction. He stirs anxiety as he describes the pigs’ fearsome appearance. We are meant to lament at the scenes of torn-up lawns and golf courses, feeling compelled to join together with pitchforks to villainize this ignoble swine..."

Yup.; 2/7/22, 3:42 PM
Bruce Hayden said...: I'm becoming obsessed with Los Angeles--maps, geography, history, local color in different neighbourhoods. Of course there are mountain lions there to some extent. I was surprised yet not surprised to find out there is some interest in re-introducing the grizzly bear that is on the state flag. It was ubiquitous in pioneer times, with animals tending to roam in packs. We're talking a specific sub-species, bigger than your average grizzly bear today. There are a few black bears in California, but they are unlikely to be found in urban areas. As part of the discussion, re-wilding advocates say the re-introduction of wolves in Yellowstone has gone OK. Maybe, except that there is supposed to be a strict line between park with no hunting, and surrounding ranchland where hunting is allowed. How would this work in SoCal or the Bay area, where at least until recently everyone wanted to live?”

You really don’t want grizzly bears in LA. Black bears can, very often, coexist with humans, if everyone is careful. We had a recently weaned one sleeping outside our window last summer in MT for awhile. My partner and I had a fight of sorts about feeding it. I wasn’t going to participate if she insisted, because acclimating them to humans is sometimes a death sentence. Luckily, it wandered off before anything untoward could happen. We had a bunch of them later in the summer, when a wildfire came through north of town. At one time, we had 6-7 in town. Luckily, nothing happened, and they headed out after the fire was over. You just make sure that you don’t give them access to food, which includes not leaving trash out over night, and give them space. Still, I carry a 10 mm G20 with bear loads after dark, JIC. But brown bears are very different. They are an apex predator (and predate on everything else, including black bears), and as a result, are a lot more erratic. We found that they were in the county when a couple of them wandered a small town about 30 miles down river. First one lost to a BNSF train. The other charged a person in town. The brown bear lost that one too - but the guy shooting it was tried for the crime. His defense is that the Forest Service had lied to us, and had relocated them into the wilderness area north of there, without telling anyone. So, he naturally thought that it was a black bear, that you can kill in self defense.

The brown bears are on the northern ridge of the valley we live in. According to the FS, there is a brown bear highway down that ridge between that wilderness area to the NW of us, and the one just south of Glacier. We now have wolves on the ridge to the south of the valley, who have over the last decade or so migrated in from Yellowstone. Whenever we would have a fight, I used to camp up there for a couple nights. Not any more. They aren’t really a problem yet - that ridge is still very remote, and they haven’t come down that much to the valley floor, where there are a lot of domesticated animals to prey on. Contrary to what the coastal elite environmental wackos want, MT now allows hunting of a certain number of wolves every year, to keep them in check. I like the hunting, because it keeps the wolves in fear of humans. As long as brown bears and wolves stay on the ridges, out of the valley floor, most everyone is happy.

We are probably seeing more mountain lions and coyotes as a result of the incursion over the last decade or two of brown bears and wolves into the county. Maybe black bears too. Both prey on all these species. Indeed, the species hardest hit by the reintroduction of wolves into Yellowstone were probably the coyotes, with their population cut in more than half. With mountain lions, you just need to be careful about running, and preferably go armed outside at night (the problem being is that you don’t want to shoot them with bear loads, which are solid cast for penetration - rather regular JHP self defense ammo is apparently best, as it is for wolves and coyotes).; 2/7/22, 3:45 PM
Bruce Hayden said...: (Continued)

You really, really, don’t want these two species reintroduced into LA. We coexist just fine with them, because we respect them, and live in a gun culture, where most everyone has firearms sufficiently powerful to take them out, if needed. You really don’t want people shooting hunting rifles, in self defense, right in the middle of 8 million people. It isn’t an issue outside the bigger cities in MT. Our county deputies carry full power M14s, along with their standard M16s or AR-15s in their vehicles. LAPD and LASO carry shotguns instead. They don’t need M14s, which would likely grossly over penetrate in much of LA.

I enjoy living around wildlife, even all these predators. Part of why we love living in rural MT. But we spend the other half the year, just inside the PHX city limits, and are glad that the major pests are coyotes. I do go armed at night when I take the dog. Out, but my first line of defense is bear mace. Never have needed them, but we hear them a couple blocks away, in the area we walk every day. Hope that I never need either. And probably won’t.; 2/7/22, 3:48 PM
Joe Smith said...: I've seen every kind of animal in my back yard (including tarantulas) but never a wild pig.

When I belonged to a country club, those suckers really tore up some fairways though...; 2/7/22, 4:01 PM
Bruce Hayden said...: “The re wilding thing is happening here on the SF Peninsula, and it is a problem for small pet owners. Coyotes laid a trap for my off leash German Shepherd and almost got him. I saw him running back to me at full speed with a pack of coyotes chasing him. Luckily, they peeled off as he got close to me, but it was very frightening. He also got into a fight with two raccoons in the backyard one night. He decisively won that fight, but was still bloodied and they knocked over a redwood table.”

My step son and his family were living south of Vail, AZ (just east of Tucson). There were coyotes, but there weren’t problems, as long as they had 3 big dogs. But the two huskies died from old age, and soon after that the coyotes got into the chicken enclosure, and butchered the entire floor of 30-40 in minutes. You probably need at least a pair of larger dogs if you leave them out over night in coyote or mountain lion territory. Favorite trick of coyotes is to have one sucker a dog into following it, and then they ambush it. Back about 30 years ago, when we were living in the mountains west of Denver, we had mountain lions in the neighborhood. One started taking dogs, but always when they were alone. Two or more scared it away. Then, it took one that was too big for it to carry, and dragged it to its lair (less than a quarter miles from our house - though it had Ben hunting and taking dogs several miles east on Lookout Mountain). Easy to track. That was its death warrant - terminated for being too habituated to humans. Applies equally to bears and mountain lions. First time or two you catch a bear that close to humans, you can relocate them. But if they persist, only solution is to kill them (unless you can find a sanctuary for them).; 2/7/22, 4:11 PM
Earnest Prole said...: Since when are eucalyptus trees "unwelcome" at UC Berkeley?

Since the 1991 East Bay Firestorm.; 2/7/22, 4:26 PM
tim in vermont said...: We have the odd coral snake around here, and I guarantee you, I give them respect. Now the latest thing is the Nile monitor lizard. The alligators are non aggressive and you see them everywhere, but I am not so sure about these monitor lizards. Saw a Jesus lizard in the yard a couple months ago, they are a sight to see, they run across the surface of water, though I only saw it run across the lawn on two legs. Pythons are another thing, feral pigs are also pretty common here. Basically, if any oddball thought it would make a good pet, and it can live in a tropical swamp, we have them here.; 2/7/22, 4:32 PM
Gojuplyr831@gmail.com said...: Bears are near impossible to get rid of once they find a food source. Relocation is marginally effective unless the bear is moved a very long way. Bears, like coyotes, are intelligent and quickly learn food sources and threat levels. Another problem with bears is that once they become used to humans and human food sources, they can not live in the wild. Moving an urban bear to the wilderness is a death sentence.

Introducing a non native species to control a non native species is very problematic. Mongoose were introduced to an island with a problem with a non native venomous snake. Mongoose kill snakes, right? They also kill chickens, small ground nesting native birds and various small mammals. All of which they preferred to dealing with a dangerous snake.; 2/7/22, 4:47 PM
Paul said...: Rattlers?

Now here in Texas the Parks & Wildlife are busy putting black tailed Rattlers out here in East Texas. Supposedly to be more 'natural'. These are Timber Rattlesnakes. Way more dangerous than Copperheads or even Moccasins. But with their all knowing staff it is decreed they must populate East Texas just as Turkeys and Whitetails do. $1000 fine for bumping one of 'em off.

Sooner or later a child is going to DIE because they did that stupid stuff.... And I will blame them for the death of that child... just as if they planted land mines to kill.; 2/7/22, 5:28 PM
Michael said...: Friends wife was bitten on foot by a copperhead. The anti venom cost over ten grand.; 2/7/22, 5:30 PM
Lucien said...: I’ve seen a skunk & raccoon sharing a meal of catfood together, but that was Pasadena.; 2/7/22, 7:49 PM
bobby said...: Rels out west of me have beef. The good people just over the state line decided that wolves ought to be brought back to roam free, so that those people could feel virtuous. The wolves enjoy the beef. We're doing a quiet hunting party in a few weeks.; 2/7/22, 10:36 PM
Ray - SoCal said...: Coyotes have become acclimated to urban environments. An empty field in Compton may have coyotes.

One of our cats probably fell to a coyote. In our area lots of posted flyers about missing dogs and cats.

LA County has a trapper, but it was explained to me they set traps to avoid being on the nightly news.

This changes when you have an attack on a person, as happened in Montebello - about 10 miles East of LA.

I was surprised to find out Jaguars were once native to California. My guess not sneaky like the so called Mountain Lions, so easy to hunt. They are larger than mountain lions.; 2/7/22, 10:39 PM
TaeJohnDo said...: In the Placitas, Bernalillo and Rio Ranch Nextdoor site, there are daily reports if missing pets and admonishments to people who let their pets roam. I've had coyotes on the property testing my dogs to join them, bobcats sleep in the RV port and lounge on the front porch, saw a lost doe, had to take my Dachshund in before a barn owl nabber her, and (nearly) ran into a Mountain Lion on an early morning bike ride. Two years after we moved in, something, over the course of a week, ate the expensive koi the previous owners left in the pond. I replaced them with Walmart goldfish. One of my favorite posts was a woman lamenting the loss of her little froufrou dog gone missing from her enclosed patio. A few days later, someone asked if she found the dog. "Only the right front paw," was the reply.; 2/8/22, 12:25 AM
Fred Drinkwater said...: The Woodside thing is hilarious. Unfortunately the CA Sec State (?) already threatened action and the city backed down. I was hoping for a whole 3 act drama.
Anyway, last year I was walking about a mile from their town center, and passed a mid-sized property (a few acres, 20 million bucks) owned by a typical liberal. Custom artwork was posted along the boundary fence, including plaints about the injustice of homelessness. I was tempted to print flyers with the address for distribution at the many homeless villages a bit farther south. Looks like the even more liberal folk in Sacramento are ahead of me, though.; 2/8/22, 1:11 AM
Aggie said...: I nearly stepped on a rattler once when I was hunting in South Texas years ago, stepped over a log and was about to put the foot down when that sucker reared up, ready to strike. That's when I found out that when I'm really, really frightened, I scream just like a little girl. The snake became a hat band.

Now those feral hogs, they are formerly domesticated, got loose, and are reverting to earlier genetic types with each generation. They are ecological plagues on the land, destroying ground nesters, vegetation, creating erosion features. They breed so fast that conventional hunting cannot keep up. The Park Service even uses helicopters to hunt them in Hawaii, and still can't keep up. Here in Texas, here are trappers: A trailer pulls up with racks of equipment that become a corral-pen, with a door or two. A mast goes up on the trailer - it houses a couple of game cams and a small antennae, batteries, solar panels. The trapper will spread bait corn in the pen and let the hogs come and go until the whole sounder is casually coming into the pen. The game cam on the mast broadcasts live video to the trapper's phone. The fancy rigs may even have a game feeder that the trapper can trigger by phone to broadcast more corn into the pen. Finally, when the hogs are acclimated and the whole sounder is in the pen, the trapper - seeing all this in live feed on his phone - touches a button and the doors slam shut, trapping the whole bunch, often 3 generations' worth.

It's the only way that works. Our community has the trappers come out and rig up their circus from time to time when the hogs get to be pest-level again.; 2/8/22, 9:48 AM
Jeff said...: Rampaging Feral Pigs would be a good name for a heavy metal band.; 2/8/22, 11:34 AM
JAORE said...: I was pleasantly surprised to read they'll usually bite once without injecting venom

I'd use sometimes instead of "usually". And many think that does not apply to the young ones.

I'm not especially scared of copperheads except we have two small dogs. But there are hawks, owls, eagles and coyotes that are a danger to those little mutts.; 2/8/22, 12:21 PM
Bruce Hayden said...: I was reading these last several comments, and remembered seeing a wanted poster for a missing dog. Looked like a whitish miniature puddle. What was interesting is that It was posted in the several sections of open space we live by. We know that there are coyotes out there - we hear them at night. The last couple days, I have noticed a hawk circling maybe a half mile away. So, why would anyone in their right mind, illegally let their prized pooch illegally run off of a leash, esp at night?

Where we live in MT is, of course, worse. That is why our cat is an indoor cat, suitably neutered and declawed. My partner’s ex has a half section farm about 5 miles down river from us. Her previous cat used to sleep on top of their German Shepard on the porch. Except that one night, an owl tried to snatch him. No doubt the German Shepard took exception to that, so the attempted snatch was unsuccessful. But the cat was well sliced up by the owl’s claws. The dog slept on top of the cat for the rest of the night, keeping him alive. Then to the vet, who charged $2k to sew him back up. The cat promptly ran away, when they got back to PHX that fall. Our current cat loves escaping and getting out in MT (but not so much here in AZ). Partner melts down as a result, and we don’t stop before we find the miscreant, and get him back inside. Worse than the owl at the farm, we have a dam, in a large river, right by the house, and that means eagles. I questioned whether that hawk could lift the dog, in our walk today, but those eagles, living 1/4 mile away, probably wouldn’t have the same problem. They are magnificent though. It doesn’t help that we recently saw The Proposal, staring Miss Congeniality, again, and they have the great scene in it, where an eagle grabs the small dog, who is never supposed to be let out. She runs after the eagle, and somehow manages to trade her cell phone for the dog, which of course, turned out to cause other problems. I am just not sure what I am going to do for my daily walks with dog, when we get back up there in MT in a couple months.; 2/8/22, 1:35 PM
devils advocate said...: Second time in 24 hours that venemous snakes have come up. Have to admit I found a reason for defunding the police. Maybe if they had the more accommodating 'bay' view of snakes they wouldn't have overreached in this case:

"a single mom in Blairsville, Georgia, is facing criminal reckless conduct charges for letting her 14-year-old babysit. The charges carry a maximum penalty of one year in prison and fine of $1,000. The arresting officer, Deputy Sheriff Marc Pilote, wrote in his report that anything terrible could have happened to Thaddeus, including being kidnapped, run over, or "bitten by a venomous snake." "

I guess they don't have feral pigs in the neighborhood, that would really demand the intervention of child protective services.

https://reason.com/2022/02/08/melissa-henderson-babysit-covid-arrest-blairsville/; 2/9/22, 7:51 AM
bobby said...: If we're really into the basic justice of rewilding . . . . don't smallpox and polio have a right to live?; 2/9/22, 1:09 PM