Vermont - July 12th, 2010

A time of mixed blessings.

We’ve been having a series of raccoon attacks. The first on the evening of July 4th got 3 Wellsummer chicks, and the second, despite precautions, nabbed 3 of Richard’s 6 turkey chicks, crippling a 4th. There was no joy in Mudville that night. Poor Richard. By admission, he’d gotten a bit cocky, impervious to predators. On the 4th, coming home from a fantastic fireworks display, he’d left the back door of the coop open, something he’d done many times before with no ill effect. But not this time. “And they were all hens!” he moaned to the heavens. He’d been “cursed” with a majority roosters in all his hatchings of eggs and now this seemed like a double blow. Royce warned him to expect more attacks now that the raccoon had the taste. These raccoons live underneath Royce’s old barn next door, he sees them every night, they come to the woodpile just outside his kitchen door. We caught one of the cubs by our coop the day after the murders in broad daylight. And he looked so cuddly and harmless, like a tiny koala bear. But he began snarling as we corralled him into a plastic pet carrier and Richard began a misery of deciding what to do with him. This kind of dilemma brings morbid humour out of Royce. “We could toss the carrier into your pond and fish it out later.” Richard just couldn’t decide, wouldn’t decide, didn’t feel like killing it, couldn’t do it. Later that evening, still unwilling to make a decision, he gave the carrier to Royce who offered to “take care of things.” I was surprised to find out a few days later that he hadn’t shot it as I had expected he would, but had taken it over near Wells River and let it loose in the woods there.

But Royce warned that our turkeys were not safe now. He’d taken care of just one of the raccoons, a baby, and there were sure to be more, adults, and word would be sent to others that there were prime pickin’s here. I’d seen enterprising raccoons at work years before near Woodstock, NY doing summer theatre when they had raided a kitchen pantry whose screen door had been left unlatched despite instructions to the contrary. We came home from rehearsal to find peanut buttered paw marks streaking the kitchen floor and counters like a crime scene, split open packages of spaghetti and pasta, jars of jam unscrewed, a havoc of cereal and potato chips and crackers, the remains of a mid-afternoon bacchanal. And they were brazenly waiting outside with their pals, waiting for another raid. That night it turned into a Stephen King story “Raccoon!” I went up to my second story room – and there were no tree branches nearby, no ledge or outcropping on the house to gain purchase, just clapboard siding and a sheer drop. I was sitting on my bed, going over a script that I was trying to memorize, and got the uneasy feeling that someone was watching me. I turned to the window and there were three long snouted bandit faces looking in at me. I swear I could hear the theme to “Mission Impossible” going. I gave a shout, but they were undeterred, not the least bit frightened. With an “Oh, he saw us” nonchalance, they slowly shimmied out of the window frame, and somehow “hopped down” 10 feet to the forest floor and sauntered off to plan another raid. Raccoons mean business.

I’d shared this story to Richard before, so heeding that and Royce’s admonition, Richard put the turkeys back in the garage in an old moveable cage that they had grown up in. The next night, though, he tried letting them spend the night outside as they had many nights before, flying to the top of the metal sheeting covering our woodpile where they had up-until-then slept undisturbed. In the morning, they were fine. He tried the next night, and again, fine. But on the third night, disaster struck. I’d been away in New York for a few days and he hadn’t told me about it, so when I finally asked where the other 4 turkeys were, these sweet, jabbery birds that had firmly imprinted themselves on both of us and had followed us everywhere much like the goose girls had done last summer, Richard spilled the beans. “I couldn’t tell you, I was too upset,” he said. When I told him how sorry I was and asked if he was alright he continued, “I feel as if I let them all down.” Not fun.

The past few nights we’ve been putting the turkeys in with the chickens and closing up the coop tight. Every one seems to be getting along well. We’ve named the 2 unharmed turkey survivors Lynne and Alfred, after the famous acting husband and wife team The Lunts. We’re not really sure what sex either of them is, which direction their leaning, but that seems to perfectly fit what I’ve heard about the predelictions of the real Lunts. Our crippled bird remains namelss. We’ve already named one of our limping birds “Laura” in honor of the “Glass Menagerie” character, so we’re not sure what will stick with this one. We’ve debated about splinting the leg, but Richard has said “no” because he feels it’s been wrenched out of its socket, making the leg pretty worthless. We have no idea how extensive the injuries are. That said, the bird seems in good spirits, it’s eating and drinking well. We’ll see what happens.

In the “more cheerful news” department, the Canada Geese have started a form of flying lesson on the pond, teaching their fold to skim the top of the water as they flap as hard as they can and then diving beneath its surface at the end of the flight. Soon they’ll be flying from the rise behind the house. Our geese hold their own form of flying lessons with Schmul in the lead. They flap their wings mightily and all run as fast as they can, nary a one getting off the ground, though they seem to congratulate one another quite a bit after each run. I wonder if they’ll feel “less than” when their Canadian compatriots take to the air and they can’t. Will they dream of flying, I wonder? Maybe what they do is their idea of flying, a more grounded, flappy version. The other day I was so surprised to catch our geese crooking their heads to look waaaay up in the air at a passing jet. Did they really see it? There was nothing else in the sky at that moment. Did they think it was some sort of far away bird? Who knows. It was fascinating.

The thick mugginess of a week ago has abated, but it’s still very much summer, now in the 80’s rather than the high 90’s. The pond has been exquisite, we’ve been diving in almost daily and it’s been WARM, a perfect blend of sun warmed upper level and spring cooled lower levels. Brilliant. The geese all give us a WIDE berth whenever we dive into the pond. They go to the far, far side of the pond and walk up into the woods and watch from a protected distance until we get our swimmy ways out of our system.

The garden hasn’t really taken this year. We tried not ameliorating the soil AND not using organic seeds this year. That’s the last year for both of those experiments. But to be fair, the weather had been really goony leading up to planting. Everything went in late and then it stayed cool for a long time. Sugar snap peas are strong, wax beans are coming through with a close second, but beets have been disappointing and carrots and chard as well. I just planted some peas and radishes and more chard. We’ll see. I worked in a lot of compost this time, trying to make up for the soil deprivation I inflicted. Live and learn.

Speaking of swims, I’m going for one now to wake myself up from my afternoon torpor. Hope this finds you well.