My best friend Claire came round for a study session - she brought her (adorable) golden retriever puppy Scamps, which she wasn't able to do when Mr Kimball was still living below. He was really strict about pets, he said they were vicious & uncontrollable, and a danger to all living creatures.. it sounds a bit extreme, but I guess he had bad experiences as a child (my mum did and now she won't go near dogs, even if they're those tiny ones with legs about as long as your hand).
That's Claire and Scamps - isn't he gorgeous??
So, today was supposed to be a nice, leisurely day of chatting with my BFF and doing some much-needed studying, but it ended up including a high-speed chase, fighting and blooood!!!
Scamps, who's always a bit like a four-legged Red Bull, was a bit jittery from the beginning, I guess he could sense the wall-critters even though they weren't making any noises - or at least, not on their previous scraping-bumping-scratching scale. But about an hour in, he just went BESERK - he started barking & growling and suddenly careered off into the kitchen. Claire and I, bumbling humans that we are, were too slow to catch the action, but there was a pretty shocking crime scene in front of us.
Scamps was sitting in the middle of the floor, whining. He'd obviously actually caught a rodent that was in my kitchen, because there were blood stains around his mouth and, more shockingly, this double line of scratches on his nose:
Claire says they're fairly deep but nothing too serious, apparently he's a serial cat-botherer and has been scratched much worse. I still feel TERRIBLE though - and it makes these creatures a lot more real (and kind of scary).
The blood trail left (now I know for sure how they're getting in) was pretty interesting, it gives me a vague idea of the scale of creature I'm dealing with.. it seems like whatever-it-is was dragging a leg, but the footprints I can see are WAY bigger than what you'd expect from a mouse or rat. This would make me think squirrel, except that there are line marks that indicate a thick, rat-like tail.
Oh, and another weird thing - there was a blood-stained hunk of hair on the floor that Scamp must have dislodged (I feel kind of sorry for the creature), which is quite baffling. Am I dealing with some exotic long-haired rodent?
Maybe it's giant mutated rats O_O
WOW this is getting exciting!! that looks like a proper crime scene :S
ReplyDeleteThose footprints are really strange, like it only has two toes - most rodents have three, right? though it's in BLOOD so maybe we just can't see the third. At least you can rule out squirrels, I'd put my money on rats, sorry to say.
awww that dog is beautiful!! i hope it's okay. it's a bit worrying that your rodent actually scratched it like that, what if it turns on you?
ReplyDeleteandersenmom, it's natural for animals to lash out when being violently attacked, as it looks like this one was. They are very rarely aggressive without provocation, so don't worry about them biting/scratching you.
ReplyDeleteI'm more concerned about the rodent to be honest, it looks like it's lost a lot of blood. I'm surprised it got itself back into the wall!
Okay that could easily be rats - the two deep scratches you see could've been made by their two lower inscissor teeth which seperate when they get long (rat teeth grow perpetually) - also, the tracks look dead on to be rat tracks, except rats don't drag their tail unless it's been injured. Their tails are used as counterbalance to their bodies when they move, so they hold them up.
ReplyDeleteHowever that liquid on the floor is much too bright red to be dog, human or rat blood... in fact it doesn't look like blood to me at all. I still say this whole blog is a dumb hoax.