Deed is done.

Well, the trap and having a heart thing did not quite work out.  At least not for the rodent.

I freshened up the greens in the trap, and walked out quietly to peek in the barn door this am.  My heart skipped a small beat when through the crack in the door, down the dark barn alley I could see the trap door clanged shut tight!

I opened the big cross buck door and walked into the dark barn.  As I approached the trap, I could see it was indeed closed but nothing...no woodchuck.  I assumed he was sniffing around the edges trying to maybe sneak a snack through the cage wall and accidentally sprung the door.  I reset it, but in my mind I was feeling defeated.  It's been 10 days and nothing.

I repeated my habit of piling the dirt back in his hole, and with frustrating regularity, he would clean it out and escape on me again.  So now it was time for war.

Just as in the battle with moles in my yard, there simply is not the same satisfaction waiting and watching an idle trap.  For moles I keep pushing down their tunnels, all during the day, until I know that there is a mole in a specific tunnel because he keeps on pushing the tunnel up.  So I wait him out with a sharp pitchfork in hand and when I see the earth moving along the tunnel road...pow!  He's mine.

So today I decided to keep filling in the hole, and keep an eye on it for activity.  And sure enough, within a half hour he was opening it back up.  Woodchucks are active around 10:00 am I have learned from seeing them around the farm.  So I filled and checked at 10:00am.  By 10:30 it was open.  I re-filled it again, and came out at 10:50 and pulled up a lawn chair in the barn about 40 feet away with a sniper's view of the hole.

I am here to report that as of 10:57am Central Standard Time, the Woodchuck living in the barn at the Granary WoodShops is no more.  May he rest in peace.  I am assuming you all are not interested in pictures of the evidence!

And may I get back work!   Gee...I wonder what's next?! :)