Wednesday, March 30, 2016

Fences are GREAT Neighbors!

I live in a freeway town.  Cars and concrete.  It can drive a nature lover nuts fast!

We don't have nice hiking parks, just those block parks of tailored slightly neon colored grass, with a bench or two, and maybe a sawdusted area with some children's play equipment.   Heck we barely have sidewalks in much of the town and where there are sidewalks, you better watch your feet because the sidewalks are full of cracks and humps.  One of the parks down by the river has no restrooms and little of anything else, except a picnic area, and you must wear heavy shoes, because you don't want to step on a needle in thongs. I went down there, when trapping, sure I could find a restroom there.  The bane of trapping---finding a restroom.  Consequently, I rarely leave my place.  But that's partly because the car has so many miles on it, too.  And to limit gas expenditures.

Someone who longs for nature probably shouldn't live here, unless you've got transportation and the money to drive out to some nature.

Yesterday, someone moved into the house at the end of the cul de sac.  Means more cars.  Since the same real estate company that sold that one for the bank that owned it, after its owner was foreclosed on years ago, has dead Jack's place too, I figure they'll try to sell it next.  Means I better get busy on that fence.

I tried to make friends with neighbors when I first moved in here.  Other than Jack, nothing worked out. In fact, the big backfires were horrific, with one neighbor in particular.  So now I just want to fence out all the problems that come with closely packed neighbors.

I found a property monument, in the NW corner!   I was ecstatic.  It's just this side of the chain link fence, so that fence is likely the north property boundary.  My landlord brother said "build it".  I will build it.  The neighbor on the other side of dead Jack's place built a fence along his border with the property right after Jack died, which was smart.

NW Corner Property Monument
These properties are all rectangles. Except the ones on the cul de sac curve.

I'm not looking forward to digging holes but that's life.  Only three stud holes for the back part are needed at least.  Guess I better get at it.  We're supposed to have sun all week so everyone is going a little nuts.

I believe the white female has had her kittens, and under a house that is for sale, bank owned.  There are also two teens from her last litter, and they all probably spend the day under one particular house.  They are not trappable due to the legions of owned cats free roaming the area, who get into traps.  And because there are multiple feeders who don't stop feeding.

With some experienced help, which I have been unable to find, I'd mount a last ditch effort.  It'd go like this.  One person watches a trap set over the front small foundation hole.  The trap would be blocked at the back, and at the front sides, where the door sticks out.  The back block is so if a cat shoots in so quickly they miss the trigger plate, they can knock the trap backwards.  Then if they shoot back fast enough to the front, they may get out.   The front person would have to be able to quickly change out traps, in case all three targeted cats are under the house, or some owned cats are, which is common there.  A second person would have gone under the house through the back foundation hole which is quite spacious, to listen quietly for kittens, and herd the cats out.  This person should be younger and skinnier than I am.  The third person would block the back hole after the other person goes under so a cat cannot exit that way.

That's the plan and this same plan has worked countless times, with the right people.  This plan usually works better than blocking the cats under the house with traps set, because they tend to panic then.  But where to find a couple more people.  That's my problem.  I can't find even one other person.

I've met quite a few interesting enjoyable people over there trapping where the white female roams.   There's D, who boasts she comes out of the house only four times a month.  She told me last night she'd been out all day and I nearly fainted!  "Really," I said, "out enjoying the greater Albany world!  Good for you!"  Ha.   She is very funny and a good story teller.  She also laughs at my jokes which is a plus.

There's the crew across the street, who are enjoyable too, who own several cats, including Dozer, who is always staring me down, when I'm there, to get by me, to go get in the trap again.  I blink my lights at him, or open the car door, and wave wildly his direction and he stares back.  He's not athletic at all, and his belly flops side to side when he runs.  I lecture him from a distance, admonishing him about getting in the trap again, and sitting in the middle of a busy street, how fatal that can be.

Their kids (son and daughter in law) live in the house next door and they have Shadow, who also tries to creep over and get in the traps and he's not as easily dissuaded as Dozer is.  Next to them is where Fletcher lives, and he's now fixed.  He's a porch white cat.  Inside they have a white female with three kittens born just over a week ago.  They're going to get her fixed as soon as the kittens are older.

 I stay clear of the people who now claim Maurice, whom I got fixed, but Maurice, now sporting a stunning studded bejeweled collar, knows me but I still have to chase him out of the traps.  Then there is miss Prima Donna Bella, a long hair Siamese, gorgeous and she knows it.

Then the house behind owns three cats, all girls, allegedly all fixed.  I've seen two of them, at least, and they know me now too.

But what about this unfixed orange and white, been there twice now, when I have, yowling pitifully.  Photo is very bad because it was dark and taken through a window.



Lastly, I will mention, Garage Boy, a.k.a. Opie, fixed Monday, released yesterday, although he immediately went back into my garage where he spent a good part of the day, finally roamed off.  But....when I went out to check the trap I'd set for a young brown tabby male I'd seen in the middle of the night, hoping its the kitty lost a few blocks from here, I'd caught Opie once again.  This means Opie loves me and probably doesn't have a real home.

Or he likes the wet food.

Also, lastly, really this time, ducks abound in this town.  They're everywhere, wandering among cars begging in parking lots and getting killed on streets by cars.   These three were roaming among moving cars begging for food in a parking lot.






14 comments:

  1. Fences are great. Try not to damage yourself when you build yours.

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    1. Ha! Impossible EC. But I will try.

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  2. Anonymous3:48 PM

    Not even google can tell me what a property monument is. I assume it is a property boundary marker?

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    1. I will tell you then. It's a stake, often three feet long, sometimes longer, driven into the ground, to mark each corner of the property. They often have a brass cap or a yellow or red marking of some sort and it is against federal law to remove them, although one neighbor, when I was looking for another said, "Oh, we just pull those out, you'll never find it." Ha ha, admitting to a federal crime. They can be difficult to locate, the older the development lot is, as they may be under concrete or other add ons. This one was about six inches underground and right beside a metal fence stud that likely was original.

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    2. I could not locate the one at the NE property corner but there is a gas line easement of five feet up there, and it may have been moved for installation of the gas line. I don't know how deep down the gas line is, but its old, laid way back in the 70's. I don't know what kind of gas lines they laid 50 years ago, but I wonder how its holding up with all the leaks and building/block blow ups on the news from gas lines blowing.

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    3. Anonymous10:39 PM

      I see. There aren't permanent markings like that here and it sounds like a good idea. There are often boundary disputes here, usually with older properties. If you have had possession of the land of someone else for a certain period, maybe ten years, and there has been no mention of it, you have a right to the land. Depends perhaps on how big the gas pipe is, but in the 70s it would have copper, I should think.

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  3. Sounds like a workable plan.

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    1. Hoping. I think I may have a couple of cohorts.

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  4. It's interesting that you have ducks all around. We have geese all around. There aren't so many ducks and they stick close to the ponds. Good luck with the fence. It sounds like a lot of hard work, but hard work never deterred you from anything.

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    1. It does sound like a lot of hard work, putting up the fence and today I just wasn't into it, although a friend brought over a post hole digger. The holes are the worst, the rest can be piddled away at. I just have three holes to dig, then this guy I know says he'll drill the concrete for the stud screws on the concrete part when I'm ready.I doubt I'll run a fence down the edge of the driveway. This property extends out onto dead Jack's lawn 14 inches. I had not known that before. But if I end up running it partway down even, I'll just put it on the very edge of the driveway. It can be six feet tall down to the front edge of the house, then three feet, for driveway visibility to street. I asked the city about it to find out the legalities.

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  5. Goodness, you do keep yourself busy!

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  6. Wish I were close enough to join your crew. Best wishes! Don't hurt yourself with this new labor intensive endeavor.

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    1. I wish you lived closer too. I bet we'd have fun. And would be great to have help now and then for sure. Hard to do everything alone. Getting old!

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  7. I'm impressed by the # of your local cats that go willing into a trap the 2nd time, even if for a wet snack. I've never successfully re-trapped any feral & I've tried! Usual reasons; an ugly wound or a limp that should have a Vet looks at. But Nope, not going in the trap. 'Fool me once...

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