Hunting With My Dog in Suburbia

Many years ago a friend related a story to a group of us who went to high school together. My friend’s house had a small infestation of bees which he decided to attack late one night, after too much to drink, with the most handy weapon he had available: urine. The attack went about as well as could be expected: no bees were harmed and my friend escaped fully functional and uninjured.

Glory Days

This incident got me thinking. I imagine that men in earlier times might have left their dwellings with the real possibility of an untimely and brutal death. Hunting down a mammoth with spears and arrows would not have qualified as the safest activity, but a successful hunt must have given them a sense of accomplishment far beyond achieving the 10,000 steps per day goal suggested by a smartphone. Even a couple of hundred years ago Native Americans hunted the mighty buffalo with far more reverence and respect than some Yellowstone campers attempting selfies with the magnificent animal for likes on Facebook.

No matter what anyone tells you hunting buffalo or mammoths is far more adventurous than finding a parking place at Costco on July 3. Most people will be able to relate to the crowded parking story, but I can’t help feeling a little forlorn when I consider my early relatives relating the events of a successful mammoth kill around a large fire with their children listening intently imagining the day, they too, would kill the mighty mammoth.

But this is where we are and there’s no reason to dwell on things we can’t change.

I have, however, done some hunting. When we lived in Southern California my dog and I hunted many nights in our backyard. There was no possibility of death, but the successful hunt must have, in some small way, taken me back to my early heritage.

My dog and I hunted rats.

We had an aviary in our backyard and the bird food attracted the resourceful rodents from our neighbor’s house. She was a nice woman, but also a hoarder making her the proprietor of the neighborhood rat hotel. The usual procedure began with me looking at my dog, Nala, in a way that she knew what was coming. Then I’d say, “Wanna get a rat?” She’d rocket to the back door bouncing on all four legs until I opened it. Then we stormed out in a wild frenzy of anticipation. I’d start wailing on the side of the aviary from the inside with an old pitch fork which sent a rat or two or more scurrying to the top.

When I write “top,” understand that this aviary was not a typical residential aviary. My father-in-law called me one day to tell me he was getting rid of a satellite dish. Not the small dishes you see now, this was one of those big, black dishes that almost looks as if NASA could have been interested in it to look for extraterrestrial life. My first thought was, “What the hell would I want with that?”

But then it occurred to me it would make a great top to an aviary for the finches we were accumulating despite the sales lady who told us not to worry about them propagating. They quickly outgrew their small birdcage. So I built a big aviary. It was overkill, but the dozen finches didn’t care. Neither did the parakeets that eventually took up residence. Once people in the neighborhood found out about our zoo-like aviary we became a shelter for unwanted pet birds.

Bird Haven (picture taken from the top of our garage)

Anyway, those rats scurried to the top while I continued beating the side of the aviary, or stabbing at them with the pitch fork, until the terrified creatures squeezed out where they could in an attempt to find a place of safety—with one menacing obstacle in their path: Nala. She was (RIP, little girl) our 60 pound Pit Bull/Boxer mix, and the sweetest dog we’ve ever had along with being a tenacious rat hunter. Watching her tear through the yard and bushes to get rats made me glad she was guarding our house at night and not chasing me.

A Confession

Nala and I rarely got rats. Every once in a while it happened and it was glorious as the two of us rushed back into the house with the story of our grand achievement. My wife was not nearly as enthralled as we were, but then it is only the hunters who can experience the true glory of the kill.

Our greatest triumph, however, did not happen at night, but one Saturday morning.

We stored the bird food in a metal trash can. It was my son’s job to feed the birds and one day he left the trash can lid off. The next morning my wife discovered a large rat trapped in the trash can with a lifetime supply of food.

I had no desire to kill this rat. I’ll set a rat trap, I’ll let the dog kill it, but I’m a little squeamish when I have to look them in the eye. We decided on a plan: we would tip the trash can over and let Nala take care of it.

Sounds easy—many plans do.

Rats are faster and more agile than I realized. I’ve seen them leap off the aviary high above Nala’s head into an adjoining cactus or tree to escape. Frankly, it’s a little disturbing.

So we tipped over this trash can and the chase began. Nala was ready, but this rat took a serpentine path to the trunk of a large schefflera we had had since early in our marriage, first as indoor decoration in several places we lived, then finally we planted it outside in our backyard after we moved into our first home. The rat scurried up the trunk before Nala could get it. This schefflera was tall, stretching high above the roof of our garage and the top of the aviary.

The rat climbed to the highest point in a clump of leaves and just sat there watching us. Nala and I gazed up at it when an obvious plan hit me as plans must have also hit my early ancestors looking over the edge of a cliff at an unsuspecting mammoth.

The Players

Scheffleras, planted in the ground outside, can reach over 50 feet tall, but their trunks are thin, so I began shaking the main trunk vigorously. The rat desperately clung to the spindly branches, Nala watched intently while I continued shaking the tree as if my purpose for living depended on it. And then it happened: the rat dislodged.

Like a flying squirrel, the rat spread its legs and floated toward the ground far more slowly than I expected. Nala watched its descent with the single-mindedness that only a true hunter would know.

When the rat landed on our concrete path Nala pounced before it had any chance to escape and in one swift, crushing bite the rat’s life ended.

It’s not a mammoth hunting story, or a tale of the mighty buffalo, but it’s the best I’ve got.

Nala, The Great Rat Hunter (2011-2023)