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I once looked up to see a full grown duck in the wood burning stove!

 

Fortunately, there was no fire going. I was 18 and alone at my mom's beach house. With no phone!

 

I opened the glass doors and gently chased the bugger through the house to an open door. S/he left sooty wing marks here and there on the walls, but I managed to get her/him safely outside!

 

Freaked me out!

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I once looked up to see a full grown duck in the wood burning stove!

 

Fortunately, there was no fire going. I was 18 and alone at my mom's beach house. With no phone!

 

I opened the glass doors and gently chased the bugger through the house to an open door. S/he left sooty wing marks here and there on the walls, but I managed to get her/him safely outside!

 

Freaked me out!

 

We had a bird fly into our woodburner once when I was a teen, and I had to shoo it out of there. I remember telling my dad about it and saying "I don't know what kind of bird it was, but it was black!" He said, "you don't say!" I never claimed to be a genius. :lol:

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I once looked up to see a full grown duck in the wood burning stove!

 

Fortunately, there was no fire going. I was 18 and alone at my mom's beach house. With no phone!

 

I opened the glass doors and gently chased the bugger through the house to an open door. S/he left sooty wing marks here and there on the walls, but I managed to get her/him safely outside!

 

Freaked me out!

 

We had renters who had birds in the wood stove. They too busy freaking out about it to take care of the problem so I had to rearrange my morning with a baby and come over. All I had to do was to open the door and use a broom to gently shoo the birds out the open door.

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I apologize if you thought my message was just for you. Some people have responded in such a way that makes them appear that they think its funny. I wasn't trying to single you out. I also assumed you wouldn't let the squirrel take up residence in your house! I have had squirrels in my house...in the walls (poor thing was trapped for a few hours), and in our attic and somehow under the bathroom sink. I know you don't want a squirrel LIVING in your house...my assumption was that you wouldn't just release it into your living room and let it be! So that's the reason for my comment about it viciously destroying your house.

 

 

You really have a very sarcastic tone. :001_huh: I guess it's easy to do that when you're not facing someone but just typing your remarks on a forum. If some of the people here thought it was funny, then that's their prerogative, just as others have a right to get upset and defensive if they want. Although, in my original post, I wasn't really asking what anyone thought about how it was handled, but just how the squirrel could have came in that way.

 

Anyway, it only takes a scared, trapped squirrel a short amount of time to do a lot of damage. I'm glad that wasn't the result for you in all the squirrel situations you've encountered.

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Wait a second. You are a catwoman and you are pro-rodent?

 

:lol: :lol: :lol:

 

I know. It's odd. I'm a nut.

 

Seriously, I try to save everything. I even try to rescue bugs and spiders (but only the cute ones; some of them -- like mosquitos -- don't make the cut! :tongue_smilie:) We have a chipmunk who used to sit on the deck and wait for me to put nuts out for him. After a while, he started eating out of my hand and stopping by to get petted. Now, I leave the kitchen door open a crack so he can come in and I can feed him while I'm sitting at the kitchen table. He takes the nuts, runs off with them, and comes back in to get more. After a while, I guess he gets kind of hungry from all of that running back and forth, and he'll sit next to me and eat a little snack. (He's SO CUTE!!! :001_wub:) He also started bringing a friend with him, but he's sweet, too, so I don't mind. :001_smile:

 

I also made friends with squirrels, deer, foxes, possums, and raccoons, so the flying squirrel story was very upsetting to me. I can understand why the OP was in a panic about it, though -- I'm sure she never would have hurt an animal that was in her yard or who managed to slip in the back door or something. Hey, I would have had an OMG Moment if I'd found a squirrel in my toilet, too -- who wouldn't -- but I'm so used to dealing with animals that I would have known how to save him without getting bitten (or at least it would have been pretty unlikely that I would have been bitten.)

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My first thought: Oh, that poor squirrel!

 

I mean, what if the toilet had CLOGGED?! Would you then have had to PLUNGE it!? :eek:

 

My second thought: Wouldn't it clog the toilet?

 

But squirrels have big teeth, and scared critters bite. They also could have rabies.

 

My third thought: Squirrels can be quite nasty and carry rabies.

 

 

Thankfully, we do not have roaches around here. So I don't have to kill them.

 

 

 

But a Flying Cockroach? I would seriously lose it. I would be arms failing into walls falling over and death.

 

 

Neither of you should ever consider moving to Florida. :lol:

 

 

Squirrels can do quite a bit of damage to a house just like mice. I would check out the house to make sure they haven't taken up residence.

 

My mother once had a nest in her attic. Every professional she called recommended putting poison in there, then having someone remove them when they died. She didn't want to kill them, and it cost her quite a few $$ to have someone trap and remove them. They can damage a house rather quickly.

 

According to the CDC website, it is extremely rare for a squirrel to carry rabies. Just FYI.

 

It is rare for them to carry rabies, but they are still not cuddly creatures. Trying to get rid of one isn't easy.

http://www.wftv.com/news/news/squirrel-attacks-customers-inside-brevard-co-pharm/nJqJt/

 

I'm sure the squirrel in the above story was terrified, but that doesn't mean the people it attacked weren't scared.

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I once found a HUGE but harmless corn snake in my bathroom on the back of the toilet tank. My roommate and I were told it probably found its way in through pipes. We did manage to capture it (actually we called on a friend who wasn't afraid to handle snakes) and release it in a nearby field.

 

 

As for the OP, if this happened at 2:30 P.M., she might have closed the bathroom door and tried to figure out who to call or how to safely (for her and the squirrel) get it out of there. But 2:30 A.M.? At that hour, when you're half asleep and shocked at such a sight, you just to what you have to do.

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They too busy freaking out about it to take care of the problem so I had to rearrange my morning with a baby and come over.

 

:hurray: You would have been my hero!

 

Am I the only person who is now wondering how often a rodent crawls up the toilet pipe AFTER you've situated yourself in the bathroom? :eek:

 

No, I confess that this has been one of my irrational fears over the years! :lol::lol:

 

This is one of the funniest threads I've read in a long time!

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The good thing about this thread (since it's not allowed to be funny any more) is that the NEXT time any of us finds a flying squirrel in our toilet, we will know exactly what to do!

 

Not necessarily. How do you know it's not the same squirrel coming back over and over again during this 15 year period? Kind of like Jason.

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OK, I totally thought this was funny! Probably, because I would have freaked out and done the same thing. I know I would have at least shut the lid, shut the toilet room door, shut the bathroom door, shut the master bedroom door, loaded all of the kids in the van, shut the front door and driven across the country. Then I would have called my husband to inform him that we were moving and he could just join me whenever.

SQUIRRELS IN THE TOILET! That's just not right and I live in the land of flying roaches. Thankfully, my oldest boy is now old enough to take care of them when daddy is not home.

I don't do lizards or frogs in my house either, for the record. They are quite alright outside, but not in the house!

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I don't do lizards or frogs in my house either, for the record. They are quite alright outside, but not in the house!

 

Oh, don't get me started about lizards! I will have to tell you my lizard story. This took place in India. We were visiting my friend's mother-in-law, who lived on a forest preserve. I went to the bathroom to blow my nose. I began to unroll the toilet paper, when out scurried a white lizard from the toilet paper tube. Aak! In my surprise I accidentally threw the TP roll into the toilet (that's like throwing a wad of $20s in the toilet here).

 

I took my friend aside and told her about this, and she said that's why Indians are taught not to sleep with their mouths open. Because those little white lizards are poisonous and they can fall from the ceiling into your mouth while you sleep.

 

Do you think I got any sleep that night? :lol:

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Just read through this thread. I cannot believe that no one has mentioned my favorite flying squirrel, Rocky!


Better to find Rocky in the commode than Bullwinkle?

I'll add that while I am not fond of most rodents, I do think flying squirrels are pretty darn cute.

Poor thing...

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:iagree: Even when I had a rat come up our toilet I trapped it in a tupperware container and relocated it to a nice sewer far away.

 

Ummmmm, just NO! No, no, no, no, no!

 

Is there an emoticon for sticking your fingers in your ears, yelling la-la-la-la, while turning in circles?

Edited by MicheleinMN
clarity
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It is rare for them to carry rabies, but they are still not cuddly creatures. Trying to get rid of one isn't easy.

http://www.wftv.com/news/news/squirrel-attacks-customers-inside-brevard-co-pharm/nJqJt/

 

I'm sure the squirrel in the above story was terrified, but that doesn't mean the people it attacked weren't scared.

 

Well no, I don't think they are cuddly little pets. I was just trying to point out that it is, in fact, very rare for a squirrel to have rabies. Raccoons are the #1 carrier of rabies.

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I once looked up to see a full grown duck in the wood burning stove!

 

Fortunately, there was no fire going. I was 18 and alone at my mom's beach house. With no phone!

 

I opened the glass doors and gently chased the bugger through the house to an open door. S/he left sooty wing marks here and there on the walls, but I managed to get her/him safely outside!

 

Freaked me out!

 

Oh no!!....no...no...no! No way I was opening that woodstove door and having a flaming squirrel lighting my house of fire....now a DUCK??? Well, at least it probably cleaned the chimney:D

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I was telling dh about this thread and we were reliving the rat in the toilet incident. It was when we were either first married or engaged (it's so long ago that I forget which). I remember yelling for dh's help and his reply of "So deal with it!" I knew then that chivalry was dead and yet I was valued for being a strong woman. ;) I dealt with it. The sewer I put the rat in was on the edge of a golf course so he could have easily climbed out to enjoy an idyllic life of luxury. I was yelled at by a golfer for dumping stuff in the sewer. Boy was he surprised when I yelled back that it was a rat!

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ok why should you not flush rodents in a septic system? We are looking to move to an area where all houses have septic systems, so what exactly do I need to know about rodents and septic systems? Getting prepared to be scared.

 

Seriously...you would want a squirrel in your septic tank? :tongue_smilie: The chances of it clogging things up before it even GOT to the tank would be enough for me not to flush it...but yeah I wouldn't want a rodent in my septic tank.

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Okay, I just told my husband about this and he said there is no way, no how that it came up the toilet. So, either he is wrong or I am totally missing the joke in this thread. He is making me feel like I'm having a very blonde moment...

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This thread brings back memories of when I was a teenager and someone in our neighborhood found a water moccasin in their toilet one night, it had come up through the pipes somehow. I can't tell you how fast I peed in the middle of the night for a while thinking a snake was going to come up and bite me in the butt. It took me a long time to get over that.

 

If I had been the op and flushed the squirrel, I'd never pee in the that toilet again.

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Ok, does anyone else think it's time to redesign toilets to avoid the situation? I'm afraid to sit down now. I know, let's give our kids a project to design a new toilet that won't let in "animals". :)

 

Well if they can get in the roof, they can get into the vents for your drains and come up in the toilet that way. Get someone to check those out and you should be okay. Pretty sure there is supposed to be some kind of screen. Animals can chew screens, so check them periodically.

 

No way it came in via the septic though. It would have to have dug though a 6" thick cement tank. Not something a squirrel would be inclined to do. They live in trees. If one got on the roof, they would be looking for a hiding place.

 

ETA: Apparently this is a common problem:

http://www.squirrelventshield.com/about.html

Edited by darlasowders
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Well if they can get in the roof, they can get into the vents for your drains and come up in the toilet that way. Get someone to check those out and you should be okay. Pretty sure there is supposed to be some kind of screen. Animals can chew screens, so check them periodically.

 

No way it came in via the septic though. It would have to have dug though a 6" thick cement tank. Not something a squirrel would be inclined to do. They live in trees. If one got on the roof, they would be looking for a hiding place.

 

ETA: Apparently this is a common problem:

http://www.squirrelventshield.com/about.html

 

OK, now I'm really afraid of this and will have DH examine ours this weekend. We don't have frogs or lizards or anything around here, but we do have loads of squirrels and wacko chipmunks (and possibly mice). I feel really badly about the squirrel in question and I would not have wanted to kill it, but brother, I do not ever ever ever ever ever want to find myself in a position to have to make that choice. Ever. This thread has been very enlightening indeed!

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Awww poor squirrel!! :crying::crying:

 

A baby squirrel jumped on my daughter one day and we kept it and fed it until it was big enough to go out on its own. They're so sweet.

 

:iagree:

 

I was VERY pregnant when I awoke to a BAT flying around in our bedroom. :svengo: dh ran to the garage and returned with a tennis racket. :scared: i told him not to hurt it, we woild call someone to come trap it in the morning. Dh did NOT like that idea! So we tried to catch it with a sheet. It crawled out through the TINIEST crack between two beams (post and beam home) so dh took care of that crack. No more bats in the room.:lol::lol::lol:

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ETA: Apparently this is a common problem:

http://www.squirrelventshield.com/about.html

 

From the link:

...protect your vents from potential squirrel attack

and keep animals out of the plumbing.

 

They might get a few orders soon!! :lol::lol::lol:

 

We had a family of flying squirrels in our attic in our Little Rock house. It took a while to catch them, but eventually my husband caught them. He and the kids took the squirrel family for a ride and relocated them to a wooded area a few miles away.

 

They were kind of cute. But I am wary of many rodents in the wild, squirrels in Colorado and prairie dogs and a few other rodents in New Mexico and California carry the plague. (Actually, the fleas on the rodents if you are being technical.)

Edited by ElizabethB
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Am I the only person who is now wondering how often a rodent crawls up the toilet pipe AFTER you've situated yourself in the bathroom? :eek:

 

LOL - NO!

 

I just came to post that about 2 minutes ago, I was "in the office doing paperwork" :glare: in the still silence of the night with all other family members in the bed - when all of a sudden for no reason whatsoever, the bath faucet started to drip kind of hard, and it hit the plastic halloween bucket my youngest uses to dump water when he's in the tub - loud DRIPDRIPDRIPDRIP.

 

I totally made like the dog from UP and the only thing in my brain was "SQUIRREL!"

 

This thread will not leave me.

 

I don't do lizards or frogs in my house either, for the record. They are quite alright outside, but not in the house!

 

We're in FL and have found a few lizards inside, but they've always been dead (too cold in here with the a/c I guess?) Just recently, we found a baby lizard in the CONDIMENT shelf of our REFRIGERATOR door! It must have crawled over the top of the door while someone was getting milk or something and didn't notice.

 

Okay, I just told my husband about this and he said there is no way, no how that it came up the toilet. So, either he is wrong or I am totally missing the joke in this thread. He is making me feel like I'm having a very blonde moment...

 

I would love nothing more than for your husband to please explain how this is NOT possible. Even if he just makes something up, as long as it's very technical and delivered with confidence, it would give me great relief.

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OK, now I'm really afraid of this and will have DH examine ours this weekend. We don't have frogs or lizards or anything around here, but we do have loads of squirrels and wacko chipmunks (and possibly mice). I feel really badly about the squirrel in question and I would not have wanted to kill it, but brother, I do not ever ever ever ever ever want to find myself in a position to have to make that choice. Ever. This thread has been very enlightening indeed!

If it makes you feel any better, I grew up in a town with a BILLION squirrels, they seriously were everywhere. I never heard of them getting in anyone's toilets.

:iagree:

 

I was VERY pregnant when I awoke to a BAT flying around in our bedroom. :svengo: dh ran to the garage and returned with a tennis racket. :scared: i told him not to hurt it, we woild call someone to come trap it in the morning. Dh did NOT like that idea! So we tried to catch it with a sheet. It crawled out through the TINIEST crack between two beams (post and beam home) so dh took care of that crack. No more bats in the room.:lol::lol::lol:

FTR if you wake up with a bat in your room animal control needs to come get the bat so it can be tested for rabies. It should not be released, if it is released, everyone who was sleeping needs rabies shots.

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OH, OH, OH!!!! TRUE STORY!!!

 

When we bought our home 16 years ago, I was SOOOOOOO happy to be out in the country! seeing all the critters was HEAVENLY for me! One evening I was on my way home from the first night at a women's bible study. I was driving down our dirt road when I saw a cat tossing a little creature around. I pulled over and approached the cat when the creature JUMPED ONTO MY SHOULDER and kept running around my neck! I opened my car door, grabbed my coffee mug and trapped the little thing with the cup. I wasn't going to drive with the thing next to my skin, trapped in a cup the rest of the way home so I grabbed by bible and somehow managed to wedge it between my neck and the mug. I held the bible on top of the mug all the way home, just a mile or so. When I got home I yelled for ds to get me a cage. Yes, I have a supply as I'm always nursing some animal back to health and I assumed (incorrectly) this animal was injured. Dh asked what I had and I said, "I don't know!". I got the mug into the cage and gently "poured" the animal out. It was a baby flying squirrel! I wanted to observe it and make sure it was ok, all seemed well. So being the homeschool mom I am, I immediately went online to see what they eat and got it food. We did a little unity study and observed our little live specimen for a week before we let it go.

 

On the day of release I brought the cage and squirrel back to the same sight so it could return to it's family. I opened the cage door, it jumped onto my head and then flew away.

 

VERY cool experience! I have pictures of it one one of our computers. If I find it I will post it in the three story hampster cage.:lol: i do have a feeling thT since it was so long ago, it's on one of several computers which no longer work, I'm waiting for dh to get all my pics off them so he can throw them away.

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Best tag award goes to:

 

 

::drumroll::

 

SQUIRRELY SWIRLY

 

:coolgleamA: I shall work on my acceptance speech post-haste.

 

I just came to post that about 2 minutes ago, I was "in the office doing paperwork" :glare: in the still silence of the night with all other family members in the bed - when all of a sudden for no reason whatsoever, the bath faucet started to drip kind of hard, and it hit the plastic halloween bucket my youngest uses to dump water when he's in the tub - loud DRIPDRIPDRIPDRIP.

 

I totally made like the dog from UP and the only thing in my brain was "SQUIRREL!"

 

OMW, I almost just wet my pants.

 

If it makes you feel any better, I grew up in a town with a BILLION squirrels, they seriously were everywhere. I never heard of them getting in anyone's toilets.

 

It does, a little. But see, when this thread started, my first reaction was, "Boy, I'm sure glad that, in my 38 years on this planet, that has never happened to me!" So I'm thinking rodent-in-my-toilet is pretty much inevitable now *sigh*

 

FTR if you wake up with a bat in your room animal control needs to come get the bat so it can be tested for rabies. It should not be released, if it is released, everyone who was sleeping needs rabies shots.

 

Also, yes, BTDT, got the ER bills to prove it. DON'T LET THE BAT LEAVE THE HOUSE!

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