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General discussion

Environmentalist Thwarted By Nature Itself

May 4, 2015 9:52AM PDT
http://www.foxnews.com/science/2015/04/30/lake-goldfish-infestation-comes-to-unexpected-end/?intcmp=ob_article_footer_text&intcmp=obnetwork

"Biologists worried about a goldfish infestation at a Colorado lake discovered a bunch of well-fed pelicans where the problem used to be. Colorado Parks and Wildlife personnel went to Boulder's 12-acre Teller Lake No. 5 this week for a fish survey and found just four live goldfish and a few regurgitated ones where there had once been up to 4,000, the Daily Camera reports.
While the team was at the lake, they witnessed one of the birds swoop in for a mouthful of goldfish...."



Nature has a way? This reminds me of the Exxon Valdez cleanup. The areas not cleaned recovered quicker than the areas they "cleaned".

Discussion is locked

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I've known people who like small backyard ponds
May 4, 2015 10:04AM PDT

stocked with Koi or other fancy gold fish only to find that local herons consider it to be their own buffet table.

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(NT) raccoons too
May 4, 2015 10:11AM PDT
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Also true in Wales...
May 4, 2015 10:13AM PDT

there are local trout farms that had to fit nets to thwart them.
Dafydd.

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wanna borrow some pelicans?
May 4, 2015 10:24AM PDT
Happy
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We're getting trouble from...
May 4, 2015 10:48AM PDT

cormorants inland. But your post reminds me when I was fishing for carp with bread at a resevoir.
A gull came down and took my bait, hooked itself, and took off for the skies. Quite funny. Bird was reeled in, unhooked, and and sent on it's way.
Dafydd.

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I was one of those who had two ponds
May 4, 2015 7:37PM PDT

filled with fancy gold fish....both did very well and I had babies every year....until the snakes moved in and over a two year period of time ate every single one of them. One pond got filled in and turned back into grass. The smaller one is a waterlily pond and a hatching ground for frogs to frig in and a 'million' tadpoles later that don't last any longer than the fish now because I still get the snakes that arrive and feed every year from spring to fall.

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I remember hearing about copperheads
May 4, 2015 8:26PM PDT

invading these ponds and that people would know the snake by its smell.

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my neighbor across street
May 5, 2015 2:32AM PDT

had to install some screening over his pond, but ricky raccoon showed up later and that was the end of it.

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I tried using netting
May 5, 2015 3:06AM PDT

one year in my veggie garden for the snow peas to climb on and a black snake tried to go thru it headfirst....as its fatter body entered, it was stuck...couldn't go forward or backward because of its scales. I got out an old large metal colander, put it over its head so it couldn't get at me as I used a pair of cuticle scissors and cut away the mesh net from its body right at the scales level. It was not happy with me as more and more of its body was able to move forward, but eventually it was able to be completely free of it. I took a long pole and flipped the colander away from it....it stayed coiled up watching me so I just walked away and it slithered back into the field.

The only snakes I kill are ones in my buildings or near my walkways....if they're in the grass and heading across from one fence to another and back into the fields, I let them be.....even to the point of stepping over them if I need to. If they're in my gardens (flower or veggie), I just go away for a little bit before going back. They're great critter catchers and keep most of the mice out of my jurisdiction.

I was worried I would run into the same problem with netting on the ponds since I knew snakes' heads are so small...plus the frogs wouldn't be able to get in or out. With fish, that wouldn't be a problem, but like you said, raccoons would just laugh at my efforts and expense of a net. If they know the fish are there, they'll get to them.

I've seen raccoons try to rip right through my walls and attic ceilings when I lived in the city...roofing tiles are a laughing joke to them as is siding. It's unbelievable how strong they are....and very arrogant in attitude. I woke up one night with two of them right outside my bedroom window that was a kickout above a front porch...they were standing on the roof of the porch on their hind legs with claws ready to rip out the screen which was all that was between us. I grabbed a can of hairspray I had handy on the dresser and gave them both a faceful before they finally decided this wasn't a good idea and left. They used to come out of the sewer grate in front of our house and were as big as cockerspaniels.....protected in that city so we weren't allowed to kill them. After two repairs to my roof tiles because they would climb up the downspout, I poison baited some meat up there and didn't care if I had to pay a fine. Tried live trapping them and they just bounced the darn traps off the roof to the ground to pop them open and go on their merry way.

Nasty critters..........Other than dead ones that two of my dogs over the years would track, hunt, and kill and drop in the yard for my approval, I've only seen three live ones here in 27 years.

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my yard last year
May 5, 2015 8:17AM PDT
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Nope, nope, and nope.
May 5, 2015 8:58AM PDT

We've only got two in the UK. The adder is venomous but not that dangerous, and I've only seen one in my 60 years. The other is just a grass snake.
Dafydd.

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They have a tendency
May 5, 2015 8:28PM PDT

to get into my buildings by climbing up the rough concrete walls and entering via the air vents in the rafters....then they get into the 'shelf' area and nest, mate, and hatch their young. Everybody leaves the same way, but the babies remember where they were born like salmon and come back every year. I really wouldn't care except the roofs aren't much more than 8-10' at the peak which means they are dangling over my head as I walk in. I finally had Derek help me use canned foam spray so seal every opening a few years ago and I haven't found any in there since. I have found a copperhead sunning itself at the bottom my of front porch steps last year......it didn't live long enough to move to a new location though. My hoe and/or machete are always on my front porch within quick reach. That's the fourth one found here in 26 years and the one that got closest to the house.

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Rural living
May 6, 2015 4:23AM PDT

I posted some time back of my efforts to have a garden. Other than maybe something in the 1st yr. the following yrs. they(critters) known I had a garden and ransacked it. I had nothing fancy just typicAl garden. i couldn't beat them off with a stick, nothing was safe. I recall one yr. that i decide to pick some peppers the next week, they must have read my thoughts, they didn't really eat them but smacked them down. I gave-up because quite frankly, the woods was only yards away.

As for snakes, I have them all the time. I'm pretty sure some hatch under the crawl space every spring. But, i don't really go there and overall they maybe keeping the mice at bay. I really don't have an inside problem but maybe some ladybugs or wasps now and then. Mud-dappers and such always build on the house as well as orb spiders. I've gotten used to it all, and just keep my eyes open just in case. Of course if the critter alight onto the porch they are dispatched. I've been surprised when I enjoy my evening coffee and open the door to a possum or raccoon or family of either. -----Willy Happy

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I live inside the Columbus, OH. city limits
May 6, 2015 4:33AM PDT

Neighbors on either side have storage sheds at the back of their yards. Both sheds have multiple digging sites to access the underneath. They're like wildlife condos. Raccoons, opossums, and bunnies appear from them regularly. I've no idea what kind of party goes on underneath these things.

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At least seven years later now
May 6, 2015 5:30AM PDT

I still have some kind of critter that lives in my crawl space, but never goes further than the one outside corner,.....My chest freezer is immediately above that spot and every day I can hear it 'purr' loudly (more like a 'guttural tongue' type of sound) even if I stomp on the floorboards. It never has tried to enter the house and I've looked everywhere for some type of burrowed hole opening and can't find any. A local exterminator wants $200 just to come and see if they can determine what it is....then another $400 to get rid of it.

We live a symbiotic type of relationship.....I don't bother it and it doesn't bother me, other than occasionally getting loud enough with that 'purr' that I can hear from two rooms away. lol I tried using a live trap with rat/mouse poisoning as bait, but either it has no interest or it's too big to get into it and the animal control unit here won't lend me a larger one. There's no more than two feet from dirt to floor joists at the front of the house and it gets to about 12 inches or less in that corner where it resides. I won't crawl under there knowing I can't get away fast enough if it comes at me, so whatever it is can have that corner of my world.

After this many years, I don't think it's the same critter anymore but rather children/offspring that know that used to be its nest and they just keep coming back generation after generation like the snakes did.

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Maybe...
May 7, 2015 8:52PM PDT

Its under the floorboard there because its warm from the chest freezer. It may have already gotten through the floor and resides in the freezer, MAYBE. You don't know and once the opening is present its bound to have repeat visits.

I cleared out my barn and heard scratching or twerps now and then and found a raccoon family living in a TV box I had. That was on the 3rd shelf of storage(home made) and allowed them as mama, may get me. I found mama, but didn't want to place holes in the barn(wink, wink). What surprised me was mama raccoon used the "pearling" to walk up to the shelf and that's a 2x4 next to metal siding(pole barn) and mama was big as a basketball(width), how she hung in there surprised me. It took awhile to zero-in to the noises, but that was 1-yr. only. I blocked the sliding door on the bottom and no longer a problem other than mice now and then. I just found yesterday, the cap for welding tanks placed aside for later recap, had a mouse home. The hole isn't that large and it was full almost of cloth and paper shreds. I always wondered why my gloves didn't last long Wink Anyways, I usually try to move stuff around to keep my piles to a minimum or decide what to keep, recycle or toss.

See, what you did, now i have to start spring cleaning. I already rebuild the barn floor abit in order to control water seepage or raise off floor my pallets. adios -----Willy Happy

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Never had anything over that section
May 7, 2015 9:39PM PDT

of floor before.....until about 9 mos ago when I got an inheritance and bought a second freezer and placed a large meat order.....so if it didn't try to come thru for over six years, I'm sure it's not trying now either. No scratching or chewing sounds ever, just that ever present 'purr' and my walking in that area doesn't seem to scare it off or even disturb it.

An unwanted and unknown 'pet' that seems perfectly contented to just have a shelter/nesting area. It also must be large enough that a black snake isn't staking its own claim to 'free' food off any babies that might be in there or a nesting area either for a snake.

Oh, well......Haven't heard it now for three days (which seems to be pretty normal for its activity. Like the "Terminator"....it'll be back. lol

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sounds like this
May 8, 2015 8:16AM PDT
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During the blizzard of '93, my breezeway roof caved it
May 9, 2015 7:58AM PDT

I just converted it to a room and used it as my cold room during the winter. I sometimes get mice in there and they eat the nuts. A couple of years ago, something got in and was eating the candy and ignoring the nuts. I put out some mouse traps as usual but they kept disappearing. I was looking out the window and there was a squirrel in there. I went out and saw where they were coming in and plugged the hole and they haven't been back.

I changed one thing. I only put cans out there now. Keep the mice down as well.