Battening Down and Shoring Up

     Night life in Oysterville seems to be on the upswing.  Maybe it’s just that there are greater opportunities now that it’s dark for more than half of every twenty-four hours.  Sunrise yesterday was 7:38 a.m. and sunset was at 6:09 p.m.  That’s a lot of time under the cover of darkness and the critters are starting to strut their stuff.
     Although we seldom see these Oysterville high-steppers, we pretty much know who they are.  The bear, we’re sure of.  He has visited Carol’s garbage can several times in the last few weeks.  We are waiting for her to get tired of picking up the mess he leaves and move the trash can into the garage like the rest of us.  So far, though, she is standing firm: No Garbage in the Garage.
     The moles we are also sure of.  They are back to leaving their line of mounds across the lawn of our croquet court.  The chickens are delighted.  Those soft, fluffy dirt piles (when they aren’t soggy piles of mud) are the perfect hen-sized dust-bathing areas.  The other day there were three mounds with three hens lolling in heavenly, dusty ecstasy, and three more waiting their turns.  Blondie, who is molting, didn’t seem very interested.
     And then there are Bud’s cows.  Every morning, the Walking Women of Oysterville are greeted with clear evidence that the bovine contingent has been on the loose again.  Yesterday morning in the gloom before daybreak, Nyel and I spied the culprits, themselves, out our kitchen window — two in the churchyard and one in Driscoll’s driveway.  I tried to get a picture but they are a wary group.  As soon as they heard the click of the camera turning on and the whirr of the lens extending, they were off, with only a single calling card left behind.
     The real mystery varmint, though, is whoever is trying to breech the ramparts of the henhouse.  The heavy gauge chicken wire has been pulled away from the uprights around both the  henhouse and the pen, and there is evidence that someone has also tried to enter the run by digging and tunneling under the walls.  Nyel spent has spent several hours the last few days reinforcing and double-walling and assuring himself and the girls that they are safe.
     If the girls know who their midnight marauder is, they aren’t saying.  Nor do they seem at all phased.  They are laying as usual for this time of year – two or three eggs a day among the seven of them, which is about half as many as they give us during peak periods of daylight.  And we haven’t seen or heard evidence of any commotion in the henhouse.
     I suspect the unwelcome caller is a raccoon.   It looks to me like clever little toes have been pulling at the chicken wire.  Maybe a possum, but I don’t really think of them as “clever.”  Besides, we had a possum get after a couple of visiting roosters once and Nyel took care of the would-be killer with dispatch.  I imagine the word is still out and about in the possum community to stay away from the Stevens’ flock.
     If I were younger and a bit more interested in the after-dark goings-on about town, I’d do a little henhouse stakeout.  But, actually…  I don’t think I was ever that young or that interested.