Caddyshack

A few weeks ago Jason told me that he saw a huge groundhog getting into the feed at our back barn. We knew something had been getting in the feed, and since it seemed to so nimbly remove the snap on lids to the feed cans we assumed it was a raccoon. Jason was convinced the groundhog was getting into our feed as he kept telling me how big it was. Frankly, I didn’t believe him. I believed that he saw the groundhog, I just didn’t believe it could be THAT big.

About a week later a representative from our insurance company was out to take pictures of all our buildings for our policy renewal. He mentioned seeing a massive groundhog at our rearmost barn. Then Kate saw it, and then Jason had a couple more sightings. Jason decided it was time to bring out the live trap.

We assumed the hole that had been dug under our hay barn was the groundhog’s residence, and Jason set the live trap right there. Jason and I went to run a couple of errands and not even an hour later I receive a text message from Kate with a picture of a groundhog in the trap. Jason immediately went into crisis mode when I showed him the picture. “The stupid thing went in the trap? I didn’t actually want to trap it. Now I have to shoot it! Why did it go in the trap? Why??” As Jason vented his frustration at his trap’s success, I only commented that it couldn’t be the same groundhog because it didn’t look very big to me. Then Jason tried to convince me to let him just relocate the groundhog. I reminded him that relocating wild animals is an exercise in making yourself feel better while giving them a worse death than being shot. Jason sadly and reluctantly dispatched the groundhog.

In his misery he just left the trap where it was when the deed was done. The next morning I send him a text of an opossum in the trap. Apparently Jason trapped the world’s least aware opossum as he hadn’t actually set the trap, nor put any food in it, but the opossum managed to go in there and get himself trapped anyway. Jason was pretty deflated at this point, first having success in trapping the (wrong) groundhog, then in trapping an opossum when he hadn’t meant to trap anything.

Jason and Kate both had more sighting of our giant groundhog making himself comfortable in the back barn. Yesterday I finally saw the groundhog myself. He was just starting to help himself to some feed when I went in to get feed ready. I heard a noise and some scuffling, looked around, and saw the world’s fattest groundhog attempting to run away. His coat was thick, luxurious and shiny thanks to Jason’s carefully balanced and fortified horse feed. His fat rolls literally rippled down his sides as he attempted to run away from me, but he really only managed a fast shuffle. I was so stunned to see him and so impressed by his fatness that I froze for a couple of seconds, enough time for him to go behind the barn and scurry down his hole.

At this point we’re not sure what we’re going to do about the groundhog living underneath the hay barn. I told Jason the groundhog was so massively fat I wasn’t sure he could even go in the live trap. Jason considered going full on Caddyshack on the groundhog (if you don’t know what I mean watch the movie), but we both know Jason will come out on the losing end. As long as the groundhog remains reasonably polite we may just have to tolerate each other. I wish I had gotten a picture of him with his thick, shiny coat and glorious fat rolls. He looked ready for an arctic winter.

Paramount