What about the R.O.U.S.'s???

So I was in a crawl space today. I had my guys working on the other side while I was checking something out on the opposite side of the house. As I was trying to move through and area that was very tight around 16" from dirt to joists I heard something moving. At this point I'll say that I was wearing a headlamp that threw a pencil beam pattern. I looked around but didn't see anything. Just as I started to move again I heard it above me. I was under a hvac duct so I peeked up and saw what at first I though was a black snake wrapped up in some insulation. As I backed my head away and the pencil beam light slowly revealed a huge berkeleying Opossum starring back at me about 6" from my face.

So I did what any 6' 200# burly manly man would do...

I screamed like a girl and ran!

Anyway the trap has been set and hopefully tomorrow morning the big S.O.B. will be on his way to another county.

I, for one, don't believe they exist.

Yeah, they don't exist.

By the way, I saw a giant freaking rat on a subway platform the other day. And being ballsy, last I saw him he was heading down some stairs, away from the tracks.

From what I recall, the solution is either a sword or a randomly occurring blowtorch. Good luck.

kazoospec wrote: From what I recall, the solution is either a sword or a randomly occurring blowtorch. Good luck.

QFT, that works every time. Remember to listen for the popping noises.

and this is why i don't work in crawl spaces!

I crapped my pants just reading that!!

The biggest rats I've ever seen lived in the back alleys of Baltimore. I can say unequivocally that the "legendary" rats of NYC have nothing on those monsters, even the subway rats.

I once had a pair of those Baltimore rats run across my bare feet. I didn't scream like a little girl, but I think even the hardend Bawlmer hoodlums learned a few new words that night.

I've heard stories from guys working in the grain elevators of possum-sized rats. Fortunately, I've not seen any face-to-face.

I once faced an ROUS sized opossum while waiting for the beaver that had been damming up our creek causing flooding issues. I had my .22 and could have placed the barrel to it's head, but there was no need to hurt it, so I let it wander off on it's own.

Possums usually aren't too difficult to deal with. While I certainly wouldn't want one 6'' from my face, the few times there has been one where it needed to leave I just put on welding gloves and a heavy jacket and picked it up and put it in a box and took it elsewhere the next day.

All I know, is it sounds like someone needs new lighting.

They have some nasty lookin' teeth setting up on their haunches as I found out 40 years ago when I cornered one w/ a baseball bat. Cooler minds prevailed.

You know, an opossum is a marsupial, not a rodent... :)

codrus wrote: You know, an opossum is a marsupial, not a rodent... :)

Don't let taxonomic levels get in the way of a princess bride reference....

I've spent way too much time in crawl spaces. Weirdest thing I ever saw was a horde of albino cockroaches. Hundreds of white ones. Yuck.

cwh wrote: I've spent way too much time in crawl spaces. Weirdest thing I ever saw was a horde of albino cockroaches. Hundreds of white ones. Yuck.

Opened a septic tank cap once and a carpet of roaches poured out, I was already dual-wielding the bug spray and wearing stompy boots for them. There were a few albino ones in there. When the cap was first opened it looked like something out of a horror movie.

The biggest problem with 'possums around here is that they are so slow, they can't get across the road fast enough to avoid being hit.

Keeps the population down.

So what were your assets? Did you have any? A sword and a cart? That's it? Now if you had a Holocaust Cloak, that would be something.

Possums usually don't have much fight in them. They live short, hard lives and I kind of feel sorry for them. Still, wouldn't have stuck around the one that was so close to your face.

Up here, I have more problems with coons than possums. Possums are however on my kill on site list.

You haven't lived until you see a possum or racoon the size of a small dog get torn to shreds by an incoming -06 round.

At work during the blackout of 2002 I ran down into the 7 train station in Flushing to use the bathroom. I heard screaming from one of the stalls. A fairly small rat had run through the dark room and gotten tangled in someone's pants while they were taking care of business. He got up and started to run, his pants tripped him and it ran up his shirt and out his collar. Several of us tried to help him but everyone was laughing to hard.

I found a possum in an old Midget once.

I have more problems with skunks getting in my barn and not wanting to leave.

Possums are nocturnal, so when I found one curled up inside a pair of tires during the day, he was less than enthusiastic about leaving. I grabbed the nearest weapon I had, which was a hockey stick and started poking him, hoping he would move, so I could direct him out the open door. He wanted nothing to do with it, and kept hissing and trying to go back to sleep. I finally nailed him real hard on the nose. He started bleeding, jumped up, and came right at me. When he got about two feet away, I wound up and one-timed him right out the door. I don't think I've seen one since.

We used to feed the poor scraggly kitty that the E36 M3 head worthless ass piece of E36 M3 neighbors across the street "owned." We had to stop when we started getting a FAMILY of berkeleying possums on the deck.

The first time I caught them out there, I'd try gently shewing them away with a broom. berkeleyers WOULD NOT MOVE, so I smacked 'em with the broom...a little harder...a little harder. Had to corral the berkeleying things down the stairs and they moved SLOOOOOOW.

After a few times doing this, I'd wait till they were at the bottom of the stairs (15 feet or so) and pop 'em with the pellet gun. Nothin. So I started giving the gun a couple more pumps. Still nothin.

It got to the point where I didn't berkeley around with the broom anymore. I'd pump that berkeleyer a dozen times and pop 'em in the ass at 3'. According to Daisy that's in the neighborhood of 750 FPS. That lit a fire under 'em, and they stopped coming back.

I would've just killed 'em with the shotgun but I didn't want to have to touch their filthy berkeleying carcasses. My buddy's dad claims he saw one crawl out of a dead cow's shiny happy person once. Probably bullE36 M3, but the image stuck with me.

Nasty motherberkeleyers.