Choose Charleston

It all began with a small hole I spotted in our back yard. “Honey, look at this,” I called to my wife. “Could be a snake,” she replied, backing away quickly. I stepped back, too. We don’t like snakes. (This doesn’t apply to our daughter, who is more than willing to pick one up.)

I used some of the dirt I had removed to plant some flowers and filled in the hole. I knew it wouldn’t stop a clever snake, but it made me feel better. I never connected this with a statement a neighbor had made the previous week about seeing a rat in our neighborhood. I knew it hadn’t come from our yard, anyway.

Not being one to visit the yard very often, and then only at threats from my wife, I didn’t notice anything else odd for some time. (Of course, when you do your mowing and other chores either blinded by the bug repellent in your eyes, or by the bugs, which are attracted to the repellent, you don’t tend to notice much, anyway.)

Then, the “Incident” happened.

I call it the “Incident” because my wife gets upset at just the mention of it. This was the second time our dog had found something dead he wanted to play with. Now, it’s the nature of most dogs to want to play with dead critters, but it’s also the nature of my wife to try to stop them. Both times, she brushed his teeth before she’d let him lick her again.

This “Incident”, was a little different, though. The first dead thing was obviously a squirrel, this one, which he dropped in the street in front of our home, looked like a rat to my wife. I was immediately called at work, and instructed to search for rats in our yard when I got home. This was not the way I had planned to spend my afternoon.

When I got home, I went out to the street to look at the evidence. Yep, it was dead, alright. It also wasn’t a rat. One look at the pointy nose, and I recognized it immediately. This was a mole. I still didn’t connect this to the hole I’d spotted weeks before. When Caroline got home, I told her that it wasn’t a rat. “Apparently, someone in our neighborhood has moles,” I said. “One of them must have tried to cross the street and been hit by a car.”

“How do you know it wasn’t from our yard,” she asked.

I was shocked. A burrowing rodent wouldn’t dare infest my territory. Would he?

Within days, the signs began to mount. More holes appeared. Ridges in the ground popped up everywhere. Our dog was continually sniffing around the yard. (OK, well, that’s a normal occurrence.)

A couple of days later, I was play… I mean working on my computer when my wife came in and asked, “When are you going to do something about the mole?”

“Oh, you know, I’ve always felt it was best to ‘live and let live’” I replied.

The next thing I remember is sitting on our driveway looking up at our house. My wife’s stronger than she looks. She also apparently doesn’t live by the same creed I do. So, I began researching mole disposal techniques.

I went to our local Lawn and Garden store. There, I learned all about killing the food supply of the moles, the grubs and worms, which are actually healthy for your lawn. OK, so that option was out. I didn’t want my grass to die along with the rodent.

Next they demonstrated several traps for me. Now, it’s not that disposing of mole carcasses would necessarily bother me, but the entire process was very confusing. So, I decided to do what I should have tried from the beginning. I went online.

Not just online, I went to the experts. I did a search on About.com and contacted the Garden and Landscaping guides. Very quickly, I got lots of results. Digging through the material, I found my answer.

“Castor oil?” my wife asked.

Nodding, I read the directions to her. “This looks simple,” I said, “and best of all, no dead critters rotting in our lawn.”

That appealed to her as well. “Well, I remember taking that stuff as a kid, so I’m not surprised that a mole wouldn’t like it either.” I nodded my agreement, and then tried to put those memories out of my mind.

Early the next day, I began mixing my weapon in the Great Rodent War. I dug around in the back of the cabinet to find where we’d stuck the blender after the last party. Next, I added the castor oil and dish soap in something close to the correct proportions, and then I blended.

Wow, that’s some bubbly mix. Next, I added water as instructed, and blended again. Hmmm…. Lots and lots of bubbles. Finally, I poured this mixture in my sprayer, added more water, and attached it to the hose. I was armed and dangerous.

As I stepped out onto my lawn, I could almost hear music from an Italian Clint Eastwood western playing in my own personal soundtrack. I cocked my sprayer and said, “Do you feel lucky, mole?”

I attacked.

~~~~~~~

As the mix began to spread across the yard, it was looking more like a foam than a liquid. I began to wonder if I’d added the ingredients in the correct proportions.

Just as I was deciding that I’d continue, our dog, Noah came out to see what was happening. He spotted a soap bubble, which apparently seemed as inviting as a rabbit, because he began to chase after it. Just as he hit the foamy patch on my lawn, the effects of speed, soap, castor oil, and gravity took affect. His feet went one direction and his body went another. When he finally came to a stop on the other end of the lawn, he just stared at me, barking, wondering what I had done to him.

This super-slide by the dog must have looked like a lot of fun to our daughter, Karen, because as I ignored the barking dog, suddenly she whooped and dived headfirst across the foam.

I tried to keep spraying as I was yelling for both of them to calm down and get out of the way. This was just the beginning, though. We had attracted a crowd. Suddenly several of our neighbors had gathered nearby to see what was up.

Still calling for my daughter and our dog to pipe down, I began to make my way to a distant area of ground. I overheard one neighbor ask another what was going on, to which he replied, “Looks like he’s shampooing his grass.” Final Straw.

Emptying the sprayer in a final sweep across the yard, I corralled the mutt and the kid and dragged them into the house. My wife couldn’t understand why I spent the rest of the morning peeking through the blinds and muttering.

~~~~~~~

The moles are apparently gone now. I guess it was worth all the confusion. I only wonder if the foam chased them out, or whether they left from embarrassment.