Elmer Fudd

Tom has had a long standing battle with the wildlife in our yard. The first year I planted a garden and immediately some animal ate every flower in the garden. We narrowed down the culprit, it was the rabbits hopping on their merry way all around our house. Tom started researching ways to protect the garden from these crazy beasts. For those of you who don't know, there are very few options for a person when you're dealing with a rabbit problem. We read that if you sprinkle cayenne pepper on the plants that it will keep the bunnies from nibbling. WRONG! The cayenne pepper seemed to only make the plants MORE delicious to eat. They chewed every flower to the nub after that! So, Tom continued with his research. He found another option, that just seemed impossible. They suggested building a fence something like 6 feet high, not only that, they suggested burying the fence at least 6 feet down, too. That seemed ridiculous. What good is a flower garden surrounded by the Fort Knox of chicken wire??

That's when Tom really took matters into his own hands. He brought out the fire arms. I'm not kidding. He dug out his revolver (i could be making up the name of that gun, he's not home to ask. But, it's the gun you see John Wayne using in the movies. Fits in the holster on his hip. Whatever that one is called) Anyway, the first time he did it it was after the children had gone to bed. He was very brave (or crazy) because he shot the rabbit in the FRONT YARD. Our house is at the corner of one of the busiest street in our town. My husband walked right out on the front porch and with one very loud shot, killed that wraskly wabbit! I'm being completely serious when I tell you that he then bagged up the dead animal and tossed it in the dumpster to be picked up on trash day.

I'm sad to say that his battle did not end there. I'm not really sure how many rabbits lost their lives that summer. Too many to count. I will tell you that children pick up on way more than anyone gives them credit for. We thought that whole summer that we were have a secret battle with the rabbits. We had no idea that the children had any idea. He never did it while they were around, although, we may or may not have told the story outloud in front of them. So, one morning I was feeding the children breakfast and Tom spotted a rabbit in the backyard. He went into to hunter mode and told me to usher the children to the front porch. I grabbed their breakfast and headed out. They didn't seem to mind this sudden change in schedule and sat their eating their breakfast. Until they heard the shots fired. Their private conversation when something like this:
(Shots fired)
Drew: "What that??"
Lily: "Oh, it's okay Drew, Daddy's just shooting the rabbits!"
I about died!! I had no idea that she knew anything about what was going on! So, even though Tom has still never gone "hunting" in front of the children, it's really no secret that it happens.

This year after I planted my garden, it remaind entirely intact all summer. Well, except for all the tulips Drew picked in early spring. However, Tom's battle with the rabbits has continued. I'm pretty sure it has nothing to do with the garden at this point. He just really likes the excuse to shoot his gun!! The last couple of weeks he has really amped up his search for the rabbits, thinking that any shots fired will only sound like firecrackers, and not alert anyone to his illegal escapades. He's really turned into an animal himself. He will stop at nothing to get every rabbit that sets foot on our property. In fact he recently found a nest of baby rabbits while mowing the lawn. I will spare you the details on that one.

I may be wrong, but I think the rabbits are fighting back. A few weeks ago while working on the back patio, we accidentally left the garage door open over night. When Tom left for work the next morning he closed it up. We didn't venture in the garage after that for a good long couple of weeks. Something in the garage started smelling. Like really really smelling. We had no idea why it was stinking, but the smell was starting to seep into the house. One afternoon Lily and I decided to get the bicycles out to play with on the driveway. Lily ran into the garage to get her bike and came screaming out saying that there was an animal in the garage. I went to take a peek...there it was. A dead baby bunny. I swear she came back to haunt the hunter.