Me vs. My Cat -- pt. Two

[Moke]

Daves Shed, finally,.... this is mostly to show you just how destructive these little bastards really are.

Daves Shed, as viewed from the Western Outpost. I have his permission to shoot towards his shed.
To get to his shed, with a shot, requires shooting strongly downhill, and, below the branches of the Macadamia trees that are to the side of the shed.
But first, you have to get past this warning at the entrance to his driveway:

Daves Shed:

And, Daves Shed, foundation,...
Have you ever seen a building with Macadamia Nuts as a foundation?
Directly below the spot with the missing paint is a hole that the Sage Rats use as an entrance to their den below the shed, and, a place where they push the spent shells out through. The entire underside of his shed is filled with these shells. You can see them filling the low depression under the paint spot:

This is the opposite side of Daves Shed. And, this is the side that I am exposed to. Of note on this side are den entrance holes right at the foundation, and, a motor hoist. And, well, an expired Sage Rat that emerged from its den.
I've also included a few others that emerged at the wrong time.

And, I was not so selective as to not shoot baby Sage Rats This one was only exposing its head, to have a look around. This is at the bottom of the den entrance hole, from above, ^, the one with the attempted concrete pour to attempt to cover the den entrance:

 

[Moke]

This is my shot at the den holes at Daves Shed, from the Western Outpost.
If you look towards the right, to the rear of the shed, is where the den holes are located. There are two on my side of the shed, and one more immediately behind the rear of the shed.
As I mentioned, it is a long, low shot, to get under the branches of the Mac trees. And at the very rear right corner of the shed is where the engine hoist is located. That hoist was Daves attempt at covering the den holes (yeah right)

In order to reach that shot, I immediately had to deal with a left-to-right wind as soon as the shot left the barrel.
To counter that windage influence, I started using the resettable turrets of my UTG Leapers scope (Mini-SWAT). A non-windy day (rare) didn;t require any windage adjustment. The average day required an off-set of two clicks left, and a windy day required four clicks left.
I learned these adjustments in shots into the tangle of the engine hoist.
The rodents would frame their heads in a small triangular window formed by the engine hoist. In order to hit the rodent, I had to shoot through the hoist.

in order to get to the rodents that emerged from behind the shed, I had to make this shot through the engine hoist, clear the corner of the foundation at an elevation to hit the rodent in the head or vitals shot.
You can see the trace of the pellets as I learned the elevations and windage of this shot. The rodents would sit upright, and, look through this gap, and, POP, they were dead.

Up one, and, windage correction to the left by two,.... try again

 

[Moke]

My neighbor loaned me his night vision binoculars last night, and, I quite by accident, managed to record Rattus Rattus on my Whack-A-Mole gallery baseboards. I'd rather be lucky than good ('cuz I ain't). I just happened to accidently push record a couple of seconds before the vermin entered the gallery.

The bent cactus needle "leaf" to the video left, is the result of a missed shot on a rodent that just happened to pierce that "leaf".
Sarge, or course, immediately noticed it, and asked that I aim more carefully.

 

[Moke]

This set of NV binoculars is rigged with a 1/4-20 camera stand mount screw. So, I found a matching screw and nuts and washers, and made a mount for the NV vision for tonights session.

 

[Bandito]

Good job on the prep work. Let us know how you did. For me it was prep day to get rid of some large limbs the squirrels use in their daily mayhem. Will soon be able to "train" some more of the little red terrorists. Will eventually train enough to have squirrel chowder as a side effect! Be Well Brothers, Bandito.

 

[Moke]

Well, this one came on the night that I prepped the blind for the camera-binoc's, two nights ago.
It is a no LED influence (lamp off) IR video of the same Rat.
Apologies for the longer than necessary video, but I'm only just learning how to edit (I am a live music audio recordist and editor, but know nothing of video)
Night Two Rat with binocular in Infrared mode.
Advance to :40 seconds, and look to the left side darkness at the upper left corner of the backstop.

This is the same Rat as night one, and one that I've seen pretty much nightly. I know because of the repeated jumping at the left corner of the backstop, as it tries to climb back up. It is at the exact point in the night one video, above.
I even had it spotlighted on the night when I had my Minimag flashlight rigged and ready.

 

[Bandito]

Progress my friend. Be Well, Bandito. Was thinking he is maybe getting used to light or movement in your direction. One day he will present a good target. B.

 

[Moke]

I tore my backstop down 100%, starting yesterday afternoon.
I added a 12' long 6x6" horizontally placed lumber as my new backstop baseboard.
I then re-added my 3"x4" landscape timbers as the next two courses on top of that 6x6, and placed the doubled up fence boards on top of the timbers.
It is now a 24" tall backstop (started at 18").
And, I took a piece of welded wire fencing from behind the backstop, that became useless in this effort, and created an 18" wide roof over the gallery with the welded wire fence as the "roof framing"; and with 1" sch.40 PVC pipe posts and as a header beam. I added fresh cut Canary Palm fronds as a roof; a bit tropical Palapa style with the thatched palm roof, I reckon.
I also offer them complimentary belly rubs.

At the left rear corner of the old gallery backstop, I had a shoddy patch of plywood where the main backstop ended; it extended my left side by perhaps 24". To take care of that shoddiness, I filled that same area with extended horizontal 12' 6x6 post, to create a massive solid backstop base.
But that 6x6 extension piece also crossed and blocked one of the Rat entrances to the gallery. So, I placed a 4" drain pipe that crosses from behind the backstop, and provides a clear tunnel through to the front side gallery.

The new backstop, with some adjustments still underway.

New 6x6" horizontal baseboard

Rat Subway Tunnel, and ramp onto the new feeding rail::

Rat Subway is in left rear-most corner of the backstop:

Right at the base of the plant to the left of the pipe is a pile of cracked and eaten sunflower seeds This is a Rat staging area, and eating point.

The reflector dots are a really good addition. I did not put any on the higher backstop. This time, I placed them on the new 6x6 rail, right at the break from vertical face to horizontal ledge.
What makes them such a nice low-light addition is that I can more easily see my reticle, and quickly trace the Rat vitals height. The dots are near enough apart to be be able to place the properly leveled reticle, and have that elevation more easily visible where the thicker bold lines of the reticle are present, as opposed to where the finer "crosshairs" develop. Its a good ambush location.

 

[Preston shoreline]

Dude that’s soo crazy! Ha! What synchronicity ! Look at how I put my lattice boards on the roof, kinda reminds me of your finishing touch palm fronds ! Good write up! Thanks. For bringing that post to my attention! I enjoyed it

 

[Preston shoreline]

I love how you accommodate them ! That lil gangway plank is nice

 

[Moke]

Dude that’s soo crazy! Ha! What synchronicity ! Look at how I put my lattice boards on the roof, kinda reminds me of your finishing touch palm fronds ! Good write up! Thanks. For bringing that post to my attention! I enjoyed it

I love how you accommodate them ! That lil gangway plank is nice

Accommodating?
This one is about slowing them down, and, recycling a large CP-xx pellet tin.

Before the slowing down/pellet tin details,......

I've had on loan, my neighbors NV binoculars. And, since I made so many changes to the gallery backstop yesterday, I figured I hit record, and let it run until the camera shut down. That was about 4 hours of files.
In it, I found a bunch of mice on the dirt floor area, around 10pm. Then the same Rat in the videos showed up again, and, it only went on the old rail pathways, but did not find any seed there.
Rats and Mice depend largely on scent trails that they leave behind. And, I assume that Rat was just following old scent trails that led it up to the higher level on the backstop. And, it was still like a Rat on Rat Crack (sunflower seeds), and moving at the speed of light.

So, I'm all but asleep, when suddenly the coffee press screamed at me to go pour the afternoon coffee. And as I'm sitting there reveling in the bliss of afternoon coffee, it came to me,... How do I slow that Rat bastard down? [sinister smile smilie here]

And, in the how do you recycle your pellet tins thought,.... aka, accommodating the Rats

The main amount of seeds, last night, is on the ledge of the new 6x6. Above it are two courses of the landscape timbers that were the old rail pathway to seed. And at dead center of the image is the recycled large CP-xx pellet tins, in the form of a vertical step down, and an even lower seed feed tray. The only way to the seed is to stop, and climb onto the step, and then onto/into the feed tray.

 

[Bandito]

Great setup/ambush site. Be Well, Bandito.

 

[Preston shoreline]

That’s legit ! I wanna go accessorize my setup now! . .. good idea to anchor the tins..

 

[Moke]

Yours is a masters thesis on Rat Den design. I have three of them (real rat nests), around here, at least, and know them well, and you've built a gem. Bravo to you, sir.

My favorite moment in reviewing the tapes, from last night...

 

[Moke]

And, this is perhaps a better look at the new pellet tin feeders, and their location on the backstop. It is on a vertical face, perhaps 5" above the new 6x6 baseboard. The area immediately above the red tin lid is the old runway rail that they used to feed on, and still carries Rat trail stink.

 

[Moke]

^ an already outdated photo.

After reviewing the tapes, the Rat that was running on the higher old feeding rail, it was hungry, and, the next night it was seen running the lower, new feeding rail (new 6x6). It was running the entire length of the backstop from left to right. It would then stop, grab a seed and run off to the left.

So, to force its hand in slowing down, I'm going for the old David Letterman bit of Stupid Pet Tricks, and, I'm conditioning the Rat to have to stop to eat, or, at least stop and expose itself for a bit longer in order to grab a seed.

So, I lowered the tins, and added some more scrap wood.

I added a piece of 4x6 beam cutoff rem. and another pellet tin lid as a second step, since other rodents have used the right side to enter as well.
The elevation of the main, centered seed tin, is such that if I align my scopes horizontal reticle to touch the reflector dots, I am at a perfect elevation for a shot.
The 4x6 rem now acts as a blocker-stopper, and if they want seed, they'll have to climb onto the pellet lid steps.

The previous seed tins location was immediately above the 4x6 triangular remnant piece by 2 inches?. That Rat was running the old feed rail at that higher location, but, has now changed to running the lower rail.

Me: Just filming and observing,... and sleeping.

 

[Ranchibi]

Looks like you have some work to do on those rats (night vision is WOW)...how FUN...! Your back stop and feed station look perfect! Looking forward to seeing deceased rats on this thread

 

[Bandito]

Sleep is necessary!

 

[Moke]

Sleep is wonderful.

So, in reviewing the tapes from last night,... the Rat has figured out the seed tins.
Look for the small pair of glowing eyes in the center seed tin [goes back to bed smilie here]

this definitely slows them down - stops them.

 

[Bandito]

Slay them Mike. B.