Death is At the Door

It’s got to be good if three dozing kitties wake up and race to the door, every muscle alive with ready tension for action. So what is it?! Hester the Bunny? One of those big fat mourning doves who tantalizingly sit in the middle of the walk? Or is it…a neighbor cat?

Sunshine, Bean and Giuseppe are combining their deadly rays to neutralize whatever is out there, especially through the use of crossed tails. I guess it doesn’t take much to get them all worked up, either that or we had a really, really dull day. Well, they did, I was pretty busy, but for them this was probably the most excitement outside of breakfast (dinner has not been served yet).

It’s a little vole visiting a puddle on the front porch, distinguished from the moles that live underground and the little field mice who try to breed in the basement (homegrown cat food?). These little guys have always looked as if someone already bit off their tail and despite the breeding mice are what is usually dragged up from the basement by the Four Housecats of the Apocalypse (three shown here).

I photographed it through the screen with the lower-mm lens, hence the dithering and blur, but it’s that little gray thing in the puddle. It thanked me for not letting Death come in the afternoon by digging through the little pack of coleus and uprooting each plant, spilling soil on the porch, not a major infringement, but having eaten the entirety of my lily bed several years ago, and the roots of all the plants that try to grow around my porch and then starting on my garden—especially eating the roots, they really like the roots—makes me a little less disposed to compassion for them. They are nearly impossible to deter, trap or dissuade even with chemicals and poisons for those who use them, and many management plans will tell you that a vole-hungry cat is the best control. Through the years Cookie was the most effective and humane vole-killer, followed by Namir, and between the two had gotten the population down to a minimum, leaving enough for the owls who visited at night. Guess we’ll have to stick with death rays for now, even with the owls.

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