Some cool all about animals images:
Year 40, Day 7/365 - OUCH!
Image by Todd Quinn
This was a fantastic end to another busy day of packing and moving. I asked my friend, Steve, to come over and help me move some of the larger furniture items to the trailer for storage. Steve brought along his 1-year old chocolate lab (a beautiful cinnamon-chocolate color - wish I had my camera handy). The dog is very playful and extremenly energetic.
About 30 minutes into loading, my wife comes runnning inside announcing that she thinks the dog just caught a squirrel. This isn't too much of a surprise as Steve informed me Mocha's an accomplished squirrel hunter. I run outside and sure enough there is an epic battle ensuing between the squirrel and the dog...but only when the squirrel is on the ground, trying to limp away. The rest of the time, it's essentially canineslaughter.
I free the squirrel from Mocha when she brings it into my garage. The squirrel does it's best legless terminator impression and pulls itself under cover in the corner of my garage. I leave it be for about 45 minutes to either nurse it's wounds or die.
After 45 minutes, Steve hears what sounds like a turkey gobble coming from somewhere outside the garage. Upon investigation, we discover that the squirrel had crawled out of the garage without us noticing and crawled under a drainage grate in my driveway. It had become stuck. GOOD GRIEF. Saving this squirrel from the jaws of death has become a drama all it's own (someone call TNT). I can't just leave this squirrel in my drainage grate to drown (we were expecting heavy rain tonight).
I located a pair of leather work gloves and had Steve hold up the grate as I grabbed the squirrel with every intention of releasing it into the wooded park just across the street. Then it reached over and bit me. F#%$ !!!!! It wasn't a quick bite mind you, I saw it reach over towards my gloved finger, grab hold with it's mouth and start to squeeze. I felt the initial pressure of the bite as the squirrel ascertained mow much would be needed for me to release it. It didn't take long for the squirrel to figure out I wasn't letting go. A few seconds later, I felt the pressure increase to the point I couldn't remove by finger from it's mouth. I knew full well what was coming next. It's like one of those horror movies where you see the blade coming and it slowly pierces the body. The bite lasted 2-3 seconds before I was able to free my finger. As I removed my finger from the glove, there was the telltale sign of crimson forming at the site of the bite. The squirrel had just signed it's own death warrant (too bad squirrel...I really was trying to save you).
Without going into the rest of the gruesome story, my friend Steve relieved the animal of it's nut gathering responsibility and it is now wrapped in a double plastic bag sitting in my regrigerator waiting to undergo rabies testing tomorrow :(
Tonight's final score: Mocha, 1; Steve, 1; Squirrel, 0; Todd, sitting the bench praying for no rabies
Strobist Information
UPDATE: The rabies test came back negative. YEAH! I was also informed that the county O live in hasn't had a reported cases of rabies in over 25 years. Whew!
Meerkats
Image by Noel C. Hankamer
The meerkat or suricate Suricata suricatta, a small mammal, is a member of the mongoose family. Meerkats live in all parts of the Kalahari Desert in Botswana and in South Africa. A group of meerkats is called a "mob", "gang" or "clan". A meerkat clan often contains about 20 meerkats, but some super-families have 50 or more members. Meerkats have an average life span of 12-14 years.
www.houstonzoo.org/
