Nature Wins

Last spring we realized we had wild animals living under our back porch.  We suspected a raccoon and prayed it wasn't a skunk.

Whatever it was finally left, with her brood, and we (we as in husband worked) set about to make future access impossible.  We have only a small side area where there's room for access and only the cats had used it as a sometimes retreat.  Once that seemed wrong, we stapled wire fencing and then layered heavy stones along it and it worked UNTIL:  A few heavy stones had been moved and the fencing was actually pulled off, bent up and access gained.  Moving heavy stones is not something our cats could accomplish which gave reason to believe raccoons were the residents.

So we (again husband working/me researching every possible solution) dug down, secured better fencing and added more rocks.

This winter I'd been noticing one area of the porch where the dog always smelled and the snow was disturbed.  Knowing it had been secured, I figured little varmints were running around the edges.

Early this morning as the sun was coming up, I looked out the upstairs window to see a HUGE rabbit (honestly bigger than many dogs) under the bird feeder.  We seldom have rabbits because we've always had dogs and those dogs do not like rabbits.

Since it was so very cold, our outdoor dog was sleeping inside last night.  How do wild animals know when dogs are inside?

Anyway, HUGE bunny is snacking on sunflower seeds and hops over to the porch area and starts doing all kinds of contortions.  He digs in the snow, he turns upside down, he wiggles and he disappears under the porch.  Thumper has successfully found a protected warmer place to winter.  Foiled by nature again.