I took a vacation day yesterday, in the hopes of catching up on minor and miscellaneous errands and chores that have piled up in my life. CPM and I spend all of our free weekend time working at the new house, and the rest of the weekend time we spend recovering from working at the new house (in other words, eating out and sleeping). Unfortunately, my day off began a bit earlier than I would have liked, as the early morning "get in the yard and pee so I can go back to sleep for another hour" trip was interrupted when Squirt discovered a baby bunny nest. Luckily, she's just curious, and not into killing things, so she was simply digging the protective grass away to take a peak when I heard the baby bunny screaming. (Have you ever heard a baby bunny scream? It's blood curdling.) I ran from the other end of the yard to intervene.
I know the sound, you see, because a few years back, Bones found a similar nest in a similar location in the yard. I thought he had found a squeaky toy lodged behind the air conditioner. Nope. It was a baby bunny, that he promptly shook by the neck until it stopped screaming. He got another one out of the nest before I was able to convince him to move and end the play. Once the babies were dead, he lost interest. Yes, my dog just wants to play with baby bunnies. Too bad play time is fatal.
So, I herded my now super excited dogs back into the house, returned to the yard to assess the damage (none, phew), then had a minor panic attack. WTF. A quick google search told me what I needed to know about baby bunny nests: do not disturb/remove them unless they are hurt or you know mom is dead. Mom comes back at dusk and dawn to feed them, so you can cover them up at all other times if you have to, but get the cover off at night so mom can return to feed them. Hence, I spent a portion of my morning at Lowe's purchasing a milk crate and some bricks to weight it down. Yes, I can keep my dogs out of the yard for the few weeks the babies need to mature, but I'm more concerned now that my lawn guy will run them over.
I tried to take a photo, but unfortunately, baby bunnies must have some kind of protective force field around them against cameras, because my iPhone's camera just froze up each time I attempted the shot. Instead, take a look at this heinous wallpaper that we uncovered in the kitchen/hallway at the new place. It's horrifying.
Hero to baby bunnies everywhere! The story will spread and bunny moms will come from near and far to start their nest in your protective yard.
ReplyDeleteAlso, I think I had a shirt with a similar pattern to that wallpaper.
Ack, the last thing I want is more rabbits in the yard! Bones is so mad that I won't let him kill these bunnies, he stares longingly at the gate when we go on walks. I can't take the dejected puppy dog look for too much longer. Once those babies are hopping out of the nest, they are on their own!
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