The past few years, we’ve had a few unwelcome guests.  Some rabbits would come by and munch on whatever plants we were attempting to grow.  Later on, we found some chipmunks making themselves cozy in and around our garage.  I’ve been trying to rid ourselves of these pests for awhile, but recently I decided to get serious.

First, some ground rules I set in my War On Unwelcome Animals.  I wasn’t looking to kill them.  I don’t have anything against them per se.  I just don’t want them borrowing in my yard, living in my garage, or munching on my plants.  To this end, I wasn’t going to use any traps or poisons.  Besides, my kids play in the yard and the "kill the wabbit" poison could easily become the "made JSL sick" poison.  I’d rather have a thousand rabbits munching my plants than make my boys ill trying to get rid of the pests.

In the past, I’ve used a spray designed to get rid of deer.  It contains capsaicin in an egg white suspension.  The smell actually reminded me of very good buffalo wings.  (Yes, I was tempted to try it, but no I wasn’t stupid enough to actually taste it.)  Of course, while spicy buffalo wings might taste good to you and me, it tastes horrid to deer, rabbits, and other animals that like their diet to be more of the non-spicy plant variety.  This helped repel the rabbits, but any rain storm would wash away the capsaicin spray and soon the bunnies would return.

Over the weekend, I stopped by Home Depot to address two issues.  First of all, the stones in our garage have a lot of holes in them.  Some are due to age and weather, but many are due to small animals gnawing on the garage walls to gain entry.  Secondly, I wanted a long-term means of repelling the rabbits and chipmunks.

The garage holes were remedied using some foam sealant.  You simply spray this into the cracks and holes and it expands to fit the opened areas.  A few hours later, it hardens and sets.  It’s designed for outdoor use so the weather shouldn’t destroy it (at least not immediately).  Also, since animals could chew the foam easily, it contains a bitter tasting ingredient.  They can try to munch away, but they won’t like what they’re munching.

With those holes sealed up, I can now move onto the second stage.

These granules contain castor oil and will be sprinkled across my lawn.  Like capsaicin, castor oil is not among the tastes that rabbits and chipmunks desire.  Once this is spread across my lawn, it should help make the ground taste bad to any borrowing creature.

It’s too bad that rabbits and chipmunks don’t read blogs or I’d give them some helpful advice: Don’t get too comfortable.  Pack your things because you are about to be evicted from my yard.

When I was a kid, I remember being very afraid of bugs.  If I was mowing the lawn and a dragonfly passed by me, I’d duck and run away.  If a spider crawled down the walls, I’d have to leave the room.  Don’t even ask me what I did if a bee flew my way.

At some point, though, I got over my fear of bugs.  I think it mainly is due to my love of photography, specifically macro photography.  Once I began looking at the world of small things through the lens of my camera, bugs went from scary creatures to avoid to fascinating subjects to photograph.

Years ago, B would roll her eyes and put up with me crouching over to take a very close photo of a weird bug.  Today, though, I think I’ve (partially) converted her.  When we saw a big, weird looking spider in our front yard, she didn’t even flinch as I asked for her camera.  (We were on our way out and mine was locked in the house.)  And so I took a photo.

Of course, half the fun is taking a photo.  The other half, is zooming in on the photo to see the details.  For example, just how hairy this spider is.

My, what hairy mandibles you have!

Now, if I could only identify what kind of spider this is.

My Aloha Friday question for today is: Do you find bugs fascinating or creepy?

P.S. If you haven’t already, try out my Twitter applications: FollowerHQ and Rout.

Thanks to Kailani at An Island Life for starting this fun for Friday. Please be sure to head over to her blog to say hello and sign the linky there if you are participating.

Aloha #161

I’m a pretty easy going person when it comes to animals around my house.  When a rabbit was munching my plants a few years back, I insisted on getting a non-toxic spray to ward it off.  I don’t even mind bees.  In fact, I love taking photos of them close up.  However, when a group of wasps think that my house would make a perfect nesting spot, I go all out.

My War On Wasps started on Saturday night.  The wasps had constructed their nest by the highest point of the side of my house under an overhang.  Having procured some wasp spray, I took my position a safe distance under their nest and sprayed it.  The wasps definitely didn’t like being poisoned and I retreated back into the house.  The next night, I sprayed them with some more, but found that I had been a bit overzealous the first night.  My spray ran out with hardly any hitting the nest.

Monday, we acquired some more anti-wasp spray.  This touted a 27 foot spray reach.  Out I went again, to attack them, but this time my weapon backfired.  As I sprayed upward, I saw the plume of spray widen and turn into a cloud.  The cloud then drifted toward me as I was barely able to jump out of the way.  I tried again, but with the same results.  I conceded this night’s battle before I got a face full of poison.

The next night, I decided to try another tactic.  These are paper wasps so perhaps their nest would be vulnerable to water.  My hose has a very impressive range when on the most concentrated setting.  Perhaps I could flood them out.  After dark, when wasps tend to be the least active, I snuck out, set up my hose, and sprayed the nest.  Some wasps staggered out, apparently unsure of what was going on.  A few fell.  But the nest held.

I had had enough.  I couldn’t spray them while they were up high, so I resolved to take the nest down by any means.  Last night was going to be the final battle.  I took out my roof rake – usually used to remove snow from my roof during the winter – and assembled it outside.  Then I grabbed the spray and headed to the nest.  Once I was in position, I used the roof rake to knock it down and sprayed like crazy.

Hopefully, this will prevent the wasps from returning.  I might be kind to creatures in general, but when it comes to an insect that could possibly sting my child, I go to war.

Disclaimer: The wasp photo above is from Alvesgaspar and comes from Wikipedia.

While at the Disney Social Media Moms Celebration, I was given the opportunity to go on the Wild Africa Trek.  Since B did this last year and had such a good time, I couldn’t resist.  I just had to try it.

We arrived at Animal Kingdom and, as we waited for our tour to begin, took in some of the local scenery.

Our tour guide soon arrived and got us all ready to go.  For the first time that day, we were allowed past a gate that usually keeps Disney World guests out.  Then, it was down some stairs, past some boats sitting beside a lake, and into the jungle.

Once we arrived at the Trek "home base", we were welcomed and given lockers to put our stuff (wallets and the like) in until the Trek was over.  You can take your camera with you, provided it has a neck strap or can be clipped onto your harness-vest.  Oh, yeah, we were suited up into harness-vests.

These aren’t just for fashion, but are important to your safety.  There are clips and pockets over it to help keep your gear secure, but most importantly is the monkey tail.  This is a long, tail-like, apparatus that will come in handy later.

We were also fitted with earpieces and receiver units so we could hear our tour guides no matter what the background noise or how far away from them we were.  Very handy if you find yourself in the back of the eleven person tour travelling single file through a forest trail.

After being suited up, it was time to tackle a rope bridge.  This was practice for the big bridges we’d encounter later.  After this, we were given the chance to apply sunscreen and bug repellent.

We were offered some Pog juice – that’s passionfruit, orange, and guava juices mixed together.  It’s insanely good, but we wisely didn’t drink too much.  After all, the next restroom was a 2 hour hike away!  Luckily, though, we didn’t need to rely on that one drink to last us for two hours.  We were also given water bottles to fill up (and keep) so we could take drinks along the way.  This is, of course, vitally important if you plan on hiking in the heat for a couple of hours.

With everyone geared up and ready, we were given some final instructions and then off we went.  You actually begin the Trek along the Pangani Forest Exploration Trail which is accessible to the public at large.  I’m sure quite a few folks wondered who the identically vested people were and where they were headed to.

After seeing some birds and monkeys, it was time to boldly go where no normal Disney vacationer has gone before (well, at least not since the last Trek group).  Yes, we were heading back into the forest and going off-road.  Here, we had to watch our steps.  Although there was a trail to follow, tree roots and uneven ground made walking a little more tricky compared to the flat, even pavement.

After a short hike, it was time to put the monkey tail to the test.  We were shown how to unhook and rehook the clip on the end.  The hook springs shut, so we were told to always hand it to the guides closed.  Trying to help them by opening it up for them might result in an injury on their part.

As we were clipped onto a railing, we walked out onto a ledge.  Ten feet below was a pond.  And in the pond was a hippopotamus.  The hippo didn’t seem to care that we were on the ledge above, but as our guides informed us, entering into his waters would be a deadly move.

You see, hippos might be strict vegetarians, but they are very, *VERY* territorial.  If anyone whom they consider a threat comes into their area, they will attack.  Combine this with their sleeping habits – they sleep underwater with their body naturally surfacing them when they need to breathe – and you can find yourself being suddenly attacked when you stray into a "hippo-less" area that is actually a hippo’s turf.  Even crocs won’t take on a hippo.  At most, they might go after a baby hippo, but that’s only if they are literally starving.  After all, if you think "you’re in my water" hippo is angry, just think of how angry "you’re trying to eat my baby" hippo would be.

The hippo didn’t seem to want to react to our guides.  Though one banged on a bucket filled with delicious greens, the hippo simply opened one eye and then decided to go back to its nap.

Thankfully, the CD we got after the trek had some nice Hippo stock photos like these:

More on the CD in a later post.

Once we left the hippo’s pond, we unclipped and moved on to the next challenge that would await us.  Remember those rope bridges we tackled earlier?  Those were about eight feet off the ground.  These next two were about thirty feet in the air.  Oh and some of the planks had "rotted" away so you had to watch your step.

In my next DisneySMMoms post, I’ll recount how we crossed the bridges and what awaited us on the other side.

Disclaimer: We paid for our own trip to Disney World to attend the Disney Social Media Moms Celebration. Though we were given an incredible deal from Disney, they never asked us to blog about this event. All opinions expressed above are my own.

Note: To see all of my posts on DisneySMMoms 2012, go here.