High drama in Casa de Erwin on Saturday afternoon. As I was on my way home from my massage (such a life of leisure I lead) I was informed that we had an intruder. An intruder in the form of a baby mole. This little pest had invaded the residence of Mr. Steven the frog. And, what's worse, it would appear he had assaulted Steven has there were what appeared to be scratches on his face. Horror. I rushed home to inspect the scene and could find no sign of this mole in the window well, though I did see Steven. Thanks to all the leaves and such in the window well, there are plenty of places for Mr. Mole (I refuse to come up with a cute name for him) to burrow. Steven was on the move, which is very uncharacteristic of this fella. Steven's more of a "sit in one place for three months straight" kind of frog. He was clearly agitated, as was I.
After some furious internet searching, I learned that this was not likely a baby mole based on Rick's description, as it had hair. I guess moles can be pretty small. I am sure you are shocked to learn that I had never previously contemplated the size of a mole. Well, the animal form of a mole. I have contemplated the size of the mole on my right cheek, so that has to count for something. Though that contemplation did me no good in this scenario. I digress...
I was mid feeding session when Rick informed me that the mole had day lighted in the window. I am not proud to admit that I may or may not have rushed Annie through her lunch to get up and see the action. Sure enough, this little bugger was in there and chasing Steven around. Well, chasing as much as a blind rodent can chase. But Steven clearly did not want to be anywhere near this animal. Can't say I blame him.
The Mole is the black spot in this photo. He's fast and small and it's a dark space. This is the best I could do.
We watched Steven run from the mole for about an hour before we decided we had to do something. Steven had a terrorist in his midst. I figured it's more insulting to be terrorized in your own home (which, I should mention, is a crappy place for a frog) than to be relocated. Plus, I chickened out on trying to catch that mole and Steven seemed much easier to grab.
So I donned some leather gardening gloves, Rick removed the window screen, and we all pushed the thought of BOTH varmints escaping into our house to the back of our minds as I climbed up to access the window. Right when we removed the screen Steven came running towards me with a look of hope on his scraped up face. I promptly scooped him up (after screaming internally lest Rick think I am some sort of ninny) and threw him into a gift bag and carried him upstairs to the back yard for his release.
In case you are wondering, Rick was taking on his usual role of director of operations here. He made sure my perch was stable and provided the gloves and pink gift bag for the extraction. Since he deals with the squirrels, I felt it was only fair. Plus, I felt Steven would have wanted it this way.
We released him into the nicest part of the back yard. Of course, it's the sunniest and driest, where he will probably shrivel up and perish, but at least it won't be at the webbed hands of a blind intruder.
Steven hopped away and never looked back. Anyone want a pet mole?
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