I've never been happier that my buns live indoors...

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BINKYBUNNY FORUMS

This topic has 18sd replies, 11 voices, and was last updated 15 years ago by LittlePuffyTail.

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- 04/08/2011 at 3:21 AM
  MimzMum
  Participant
  8029 posts
  I generally take Jenna out for her last walk at around midnight here, despite the season. Tonight was no different.
  
  But when I got her into the arctic entry there was a sound coming from outside that I knew, but couldn’t quite place at first…till we walked out the door into the falling snow…
  
  …and I realized there is an OWL…a BIG one…hooting in my neighbors’ trees.
  
  Well, Jenna still has to potty, so I took her down the driveway, trying to discern exactly where the bird is. Jenna is on short lead, needless to say. I can hear it getting louder as I get closer to my neighbor’s driveway and it’s obvious it’s within a few hundred yards of us. By this time, Jenna is doing circles around my legs while I’m shining my halogen flashlight into the treetops to see if I can spot it.
  
  I turn around and here’s Hello Kitty, running past us and down towards where the owl is. It’s late, so I can’t yell at her, but I give a loud hiss and tell her to get her butt back home. Luckily she hears the owl too and begins backtracking fast.
  
  So by the time we’re back home with Kitty leading the way, I can hear ANOTHER owl in the trees on our property off to the left of the first owl…oookay. Time to see if Kitty will go indoors.
  
  She dodges me for a bit, so I go put Jenna inside with my daughter and go back out trying to see if I can at least coax her into the arctic entry. (Hubby usually has to put her out at night so he can sleep.)
  
  I finally got her into the entryway and by this time I can tell there are actually THREE owls within two streets of our house. I can hear three separate hoots coming from out there in the dark and the snow, which is getting heavier. It is nothing short of freaky to hear these noises coming at you from pitch black darkness.
  
  Well, hubby got up and I told him about the owls and where the cat was, he told me to put her back out anyway and I think he’s brought her around the back side of the house. She has places to hide out there, and I don’t think I could hear the owls anymore by that time, but it’s still creepy. We’ve had a bumper crop of wild bunnies here. I could see itty bitty tracks almost to our front door tonight. It scares me to think how many of them may fall prey to these birds, especially since if there are so many nearby, they must be protecting eggs by now, or will be soon.
  
  I am SO glad my bunnies live inside. Not just the predators, but the weather…I mean, who could keep a little helpless bun outdoors with all the dangers out there? It just wrenched my heart to hear those sounds, because I know it means no good for our wild ones out there.
  
  Walks with Jenna now take on a new level of terror…the bobcat and the fox all winter, not to mention the moose, were bad enough. And I’m pretty sure I smelled a porcupine going through last night. It’s turning into grand central station for the wild things out here!
- 04/08/2011 at 5:05 AM
  RabbitPam
  Moderator
  11002 posts
  Good grief, MM!
  I am still concerned about Hello, Kitty. Can you put out a little dog house for all your various pets and friends out there to use? I guess you’d need to shine a light in there first so a fox doesn’t take up residence in it. Hmmm. Rethinking this.
  
  Maybe Hello Kitty needs to stay in for a while. Those Owls sound like they’re going to start snapping their fingers – “When you’re a Jet you’re a Jet all the way….”
- 04/08/2011 at 6:49 AM
  mossling
  Participant
  229 posts
  when we lived in anchorage, we had a pair of bald eagles that liked to hang out in the field right behind our house. i was TERRIFIED they would get our min pin. to the day he died, he never went out unaccompanied again.
- 04/08/2011 at 8:50 AM
  Malp_15
  Participant
  601 posts
  I would keep your kitty in for now. I work at a vet office and we have seen a large chihuaha (about 13 pounds) get picked up and dropped by an owl! It’s talons pierced the dogs lungs! The poor thing survived, but it was immobile for quite some time.
- 04/08/2011 at 9:35 AM
  mocha200
  Participant
  4486 posts
  why can’t kitty stay inside?
- 04/08/2011 at 11:16 AM
  Michelle&Lolli
  Participant
  2347 posts
  Ok, this is totally bad, but this brought to mind that scene in The Proposal with Sandra Bullock where the little dog gets picked up by a large bird. While it was slightly funny in the movie, it would be horrific to see in real life.
  
  I would be totally freaked out too. Wow…so scary!!!
- 04/08/2011 at 2:06 PM
  MimzMum
  Participant
  8029 posts
  Well, Kitty did wind up coming back in last night after I posted, and she pretty much stayed in. But she is always uppity at night since she was a feral cat and she likes to hunt and play all night, which keeps my husband from getting sleep, so either I’m going to have to keep poking her awake and messing with her during the day so she’ll be too tired to go out at night, (go figure she’d rather sleep on her cushion all day-weather isn’t quite nice enough for her to go outdoors yet) or I’ll have to find some way to keep her up at the front end of the house.
  
  If only she would get along with my other two cats (and they with her) she could stay there. But they all hate one another. Tooey’s attitude has turned to downright evil since Kitty came to live with us and she’ll snap at Griff and steal his comfy spots and finds any excuse to start a fight with him. So we’ve divided the house into two halves to keep the peace.
  
  Kitty is an experienced hunter herself, but she would never hear those birds coming. I just kept praying all night that the three were too focused on warning each other off than looking for a nice plump cat for dinner. (She IS heavy, has to weigh about 15 pounds.) But yeah, Malp, I am not happy with the situation. Like I said, we’ve got plenty of places for her to take shelter if necessary, but she would have no warning if they aren’t out there hooting. And if they’re hunting, they aren’t telling anyone about it.
  
  Does anyone know of any way to get owls to leave an area? I mean, the ravens are bad enough, I really don’t want these creatures getting comfortable here.
  See…this is why I wanted a BIG dog. >_< (apologies to Jenna)
  
  Mossling, how long ago did you live in Anchorage? I’m actually surprised how many people I find who have spent some time in Alaska.
- 04/08/2011 at 3:16 PM
  LBJ10
  Moderator
  17242 posts
  I was at the park the other day with my dog. She’s a doxie, but she weighs 15 pounds (she’s a good sized standard). She’s old, so I usually let her off the leash and let her doddle around as long as no other dogs are around. Anyway, I was casually strolling along and I looked back to where she was sniffing a tree. Suddenly, a large red-tailed hawk came circling around and then flew really low (I’d say no more than 15 feet up or so) as he passed over my dog. Made me think maybe he had thought about it but then realized she was too big to carry off. Eek!
- 04/08/2011 at 8:47 PM
  Eepster
  Participant
  1236 posts
  You don’t need to live out in the wild to have predator issues these days. Wildlife is just going through some kind of renaissance. I live 5 minutes outside Manhattan, and we are getting predators.
  
  When I was a kid, the closest thing to wildlife we had were squirrels and duck ponds full of domestic ducks people had let go when they weren’t cute yellow balls of fluff anymore. Very occasionally, you smelled a skunk, especially if you were visiting a further out suburb, but that was it. Even the summer camp I went to (2 hours further from the city than we lived) never had the larger animals, such as bears or deer.
  
  These days, there are deer everywhere. There have been black bears tromping through the suburbs. It happened gradually. At first it was just raccoons becoming more common. Then hawks started to come around. Now, we are seeing all the animals that haven’t been common in this part of NJ for over 200 years. It’s kind of strange and amazing.
  
  In most ways it really is a wonderful triumph of nature, but of course predators pose problems for pets.
  
  Just this afternoon while Porky was having exercise, all the birds in the tree outside our den started calling to each other about something. Porky immediately went on high alert and started thumping. Then he dived under a bookcase. Of course, whatever it was that got all the prey animals all upset wasn’t going to be able to get into our den, but Porky wasn’t taking any chances.
- 04/08/2011 at 11:21 PM
  MimzMum
  Participant
  8029 posts
  I guess because I always think of NJ as being so close to New York City, I can’t imagine why they call it the ‘Garden State’, (so I keep thinking of tenements, brownstones and elevated railways when I try to picture it)…well now I know. ^_^
  That’s got to be rough on the domestic animals though. And the wild creatures must be desperate to bleed into the cities like that. Where I used to live in California, they were just putting in a new freeway when I was in grade school. Up until the time they had it completed, we had wild deer coming into our back yard from across the freeway. Of course, they didn’t really stop after cars began using it, so there were quite a few that got hit. It was always really sad.
  
  I could actually hear the owl closest to us through the walls of the house, so I was surprised that none of my buns were going postal. Usually if my hubby so much as sneezes, they are thumping like crazy. Fiver will often begin thumping early in the morning for no apparent reason and I can never figure out why…except for the time that the snow started melting off the roof late one night and it was barely creaking down the eaves and it had him scared, so he started letting me know something was changing. ^_^
  
  I think someone here had a bun who let them know there was an intruder trying to get into her house…don’t remember which one of us it was though.
- 04/09/2011 at 5:10 AM
  LittlePuffyTail
  Moderator
  18092 posts
  Creepy! I find owls scary looking. Probably because they are so huge (and they eat rabbits). Keep an eye on Kitty!!!!!
  
  I know we do have owls around here but I’ve never seen any. I’d be more worried about Eagles around here if my rabbits were outdoors. The other day there was an article in the paper about leaving your pets inside because the Bald Eagles have been stealing cats off porches. That’s so sad. One woman watched the eagle carry her cat away. That would be unbearable.
  
  And the wild creatures must be desperate to bleed into the cities like that.
  
  They often don’t have a choice. I get so angry, around here, they keep ripping out forests to put in duplexes or apartments. Where do the animals that live there go?
- 04/09/2011 at 1:55 PM
  mossling
  Participant
  229 posts
  we left alaska in october ’09. we’re military, so when uncle sam said it was time to leave the place of my dreams, and move to OKLAHOMA, we didn’t have much of a choice. we’ll go back after my husband retires, though.
- 04/09/2011 at 2:23 PM
  LBJ10
  Moderator
  17242 posts
  Speaking of owls, I remember my mom calling me frantic because she saw a little screech owl. It was early in the morning, right around sunrise. There were a bunch of doves and sparrows eating seed that my mom had put out on the ground. A wild bunny had come over to eat some of the seed as well. All of the sudden, something swooped down and snatched one of the doves. The bunny barely budged! My mom asked me why the owl didn’t go for the bunny. I said it was probably because the dove was an easier target. I mean, the bunny weighed more and was faster (ever see how slow doves are?). I think the owl didn’t want to have to fight whatever it was he caught so he went for the dove.
- 04/09/2011 at 10:57 PM
  MimzMum
  Participant
  8029 posts
  We do have boreal owls there, little tiny ones. When we first moved to Alaska (I came from California…’with-a-banjo-on-my-knee’…haha) the kids got to go on a nature hike with some folks from fish & game and met several baby ducks and a pair of boreal owl babies that were being monitored by the good chaps who brought us along with them. My son was upset because a duck pooped on his hand, but the funniest by far was the naturalist taking one of the baby owls and tucking him head first into his waders while he measured the second one. The mum was about 20 feet away in the top of a tree giving us all the stinkeye the whole time they were doing their calculations. ^_^
  I like owls well enough, (think Hedwig) just not near my furbabies, thank you very much.
  I often worry that Jenna will get snapped up by any larger animal while we’re walking. I don’t think I could bear that, it would probably be the only time I would take out after a wild thing with a weapon. I realize they have to eat, but heck, there’s some nice steak I had to throw out in my garbage they’re welcome to instead, if necessary.
  Kitty was unintentionally aggravating a pair of ravens last week while we were all out walking together. They act just like the little blackbirds and dive bomb you if you are too close to their nests. I hear they remember faces too…so you want to treat them nice, or they’ll be taking down your license plate for future reference…lol.
  It’s not just wild things though…. A local lady here lost her Yorkie years ago when they went out walking and got caught by a dog team going by. The lead grabbed her little one right in front of her and killed it. I think this dog had a problem with smaller sized dogs. Perhaps it thought the Yorkie was a cat, I don’t know. It was a terrible thing. So I always yield to any other dog and pick Jenna up or go a different way. Sadly, Kitty seems to have deathwish of late, as she’s also run in front of a few cars while she’s shadowing Jenna and me on our walks. I would love nothing more than for her to stay an indoor kitty, but she’s spent most of her life outside at least during the summer. She’d go positively mad if I restrained her too much.
  
  Haven’t heard the owls since that night…but I’m not sure I feel any better if I can’t hear them…means they’re probably hunting.
  
  Mossling, when you return, come up to “San” Fairbanks…we have nicer weather than “Los” Anchorage! lol
- 04/10/2011 at 12:19 AM
  Monkeybun
  Participant
  10479 posts
  I spent 7 months in Ketchikan… was pretty
- 04/10/2011 at 1:25 AM
  MimzMum
  Participant
  8029 posts
  lolz…Sorry I didn’t have my sarcasm button on. ^_^ I was being facetious saying that Fairbanks has nicer weather. Personally, I prefer someplace with temps that never go below +50 F and a nice sandy beach to walk on.
  
  I’ve only seen pictures of southeast Alaska, but it always looks so much nicer (and GREENER) than the Interior.
  I miss real trees. We mostly have things like matchsticks here. Even so, it’s a pity when I hear someone with their chainsaw out. My husband’s done some clearing here and at the place where he built his business, and every time he took down a tree I cried. ;_;
- 04/10/2011 at 3:01 AM
  cactuspancake
  Participant
  536 posts
  Man I love owls. Think about the good things, foxes are probably scared to take their pups there, and they eat mostly field mice. They probably keep possums away as well. Yeah my cousin’s cats keep getting eaten by cougars lol… I wouldn’t keep anything outside there if I were you. Keep your little puppy on a leash and all is good!
- 04/10/2011 at 5:10 PM
  mossling
  Participant
  229 posts
  Posted By MimzMum on 04/10/2011 01:25 AM
  lolz…Sorry I didn’t have my sarcasm button on. ^_^ I was being facetious saying that Fairbanks has nicer weather. Personally, I prefer someplace with temps that never go below +50 F and a nice sandy beach to walk on.
  
  I’ve only seen pictures of southeast Alaska, but it always looks so much nicer (and GREENER) than the Interior.
  I miss real trees. We mostly have things like matchsticks here. Even so, it’s a pity when I hear someone with their chainsaw out. My husband’s done some clearing here and at the place where he built his business, and every time he took down a tree I cried. ;_;
  
  hahaha i saw that, and was like, huh? we never made it up to fairbanks, but i have some great friends who live there. i never heard anything BUT complaints about the weather! a place were -60 is a common temp is not a place i want to be! we loved anchorage, though. we’re hoping to retire either in eagle river, or on kodiak. how long have you been in alaska?
- 04/11/2011 at 4:33 AM
  LittlePuffyTail
  Moderator
  18092 posts
  Mimz- That’s so sad about the little yorkie! Were they Siberian Huskies? I have a friend who used to breed those and her dogs were known to be ruthless cat killers. They even pulled the tail off a collie! Beautiful but not my kind of dog.
  
  I would love to see some pictures of where you live. Alaska intrigues me.
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