RoscoeElegante
Poster Extraordinaire
So just a bit ago, I found a murdered bunny in our (entirely fenced) backyard. Wondering what critter would've just killed the thing and not eaten it. Just a smallish wound on its back, and two at its neck. Look like puncture wounds. Probably worsened by the eager flies. Not ripped open to be eaten at all.
Definitely wasn't our dog. She's quite feral and aggressive, so we monitor her carefully. We chase the resident rabbits and bunnies out of our backyard before we let her out. We had a rabid raccoon a few years ago in the yard beside us, and a son saw an iffy-looking raccoon (in daylight) a month or so ago. A large park, with some wooded and thicket areas, is right behind us. So for that reason, too, the dog never goes out unless the yard's been checked first and she's watched. (She also can jump the damn fence no matter how well we Alcatraz it.) I let her out pretty late last night, around 2 a.m., and not again until late this morning. I'm the only one home at the moment, so one of my sons couldn't have left her out without my knowledge or unsupervised. Watched her every moment, flashlight in hand. So it wasn't our dog.
We have coyotes, hawks, owls, and (probably) foxes around here. But wouldn't they eat/take the carcass? The bunny was slightly stiff when I shoveled it to its final resting place. (Sadly, bagged and in the garbage, since I don't want the dog or anything else digging it up, and I couldn't just fling it into the park or a neighbor's yard.) So it's been there some time.
I'm thinking...cat. Indeed, a neighbor's cat--though old, arthritic, and one-eyed after being hit by a car--relentlessly hunts. But usually small stuff. Mice, voles, chipmunks, occasionally a mourning dove. It gnaws what it murders. While this bunny was indeed not yet a rabbit, maybe just by being that much bigger than its usual fare, the old cat was happy just killing it?
So weird and disturbing that seeing a dead bunny is so sad, yet thinking of steak makes me drool....
Definitely wasn't our dog. She's quite feral and aggressive, so we monitor her carefully. We chase the resident rabbits and bunnies out of our backyard before we let her out. We had a rabid raccoon a few years ago in the yard beside us, and a son saw an iffy-looking raccoon (in daylight) a month or so ago. A large park, with some wooded and thicket areas, is right behind us. So for that reason, too, the dog never goes out unless the yard's been checked first and she's watched. (She also can jump the damn fence no matter how well we Alcatraz it.) I let her out pretty late last night, around 2 a.m., and not again until late this morning. I'm the only one home at the moment, so one of my sons couldn't have left her out without my knowledge or unsupervised. Watched her every moment, flashlight in hand. So it wasn't our dog.
We have coyotes, hawks, owls, and (probably) foxes around here. But wouldn't they eat/take the carcass? The bunny was slightly stiff when I shoveled it to its final resting place. (Sadly, bagged and in the garbage, since I don't want the dog or anything else digging it up, and I couldn't just fling it into the park or a neighbor's yard.) So it's been there some time.
I'm thinking...cat. Indeed, a neighbor's cat--though old, arthritic, and one-eyed after being hit by a car--relentlessly hunts. But usually small stuff. Mice, voles, chipmunks, occasionally a mourning dove. It gnaws what it murders. While this bunny was indeed not yet a rabbit, maybe just by being that much bigger than its usual fare, the old cat was happy just killing it?
So weird and disturbing that seeing a dead bunny is so sad, yet thinking of steak makes me drool....
