I give up.

I just freaking give up.

No, really. This time I mean it.

This micro-farming thing is completely unsustainable and I am so overwhelmed by the incessant assault on my sanity that I’m afraid I’m just going to call it quits. 

Because they don’t give up.

They just don’t freaking give up.

So it looks like I’m going to have to.

You have no idea.

Back in January I detailed the inbound invasion of gophers on the newly sprouted crops in the greenhouse. These were dispatched with some rapidity and sent off to Iceland (AKA: stuffed into a baggie in the freezer) a location which has caused me no end of rolled eyes and “You’re nuts if you think I’m going in there” type comments.

The upside (if anything that disturbs the domestic situation to such an extent can have one) is that 1) the local wildlife shelter (although they think I’m nuts too) is happy to have the organically fed and snap-trap deceased fur-sicles to feed to their rehabilitating eagles and 2) the gophers are all gone.

I’m not sure if item #2 is from my efforts or the actions of recently-recuperated birds-of-prey showing their gratitude. In either case I’ll be happy to take the credit; thank you very much.

But something I didn’t tell you was that the ultimate death in the greenhouse was not a gopher but one of our old friends: a rat.

Last summer, I reported, we had a pair of rattus rattus, or possibly one rattusand one norvegicus since only one was black, that pest of Asian origins that has spread worldwide hand-in-hand with the most-destructive invasive species: us. One of those rats I dispatched with the time-proven Victor snap-trap which brings a steel rectangle down upon the unsuspecting varmint’s delicate spine at lightning speed resulting in a quick, if not particularly clean, death. The other simply vanished; hopefully in the needle-sharp talons of a healed eagle. Two in, two out. Done.

But there is a reason we humans use rats in our studies of society, overeating, addiction, and intelligence: namely, that we are allowed to do things to rats that it is illegal to do to people. Other than that we and rats are so alike that the results of the aforementioned research can be immediately applied to humans without any further extension. Consider the various carcinogens that have been banned – or not – just by being tested in rats without concern of their effect on people.

Which brings us to that last little item up there: intelligence.

If you take all the science in the world and pull any one thing that is absolutely, positively, beyond any shadow of a doubt bad for us and climb to the tallest hill and have everybody – scientists, the press, government (hey, it’s a hypothetical situation, okay?) – all shout that this thing is very, very bad for us, We the People will respond by completely ignoring the message and continuing in our self-destructive ways. This has been shown time and time again from such wildly diverse activities as eating nothing but McDonalds, using tobacco products, drinking polluted water, or global warming. No matter what, a sizeable portion of the population will reject the information out-of-hand and go on their merry way.

Rats? Not so much.

This year’s rat problem began with the Micro-farm Beautification Proposal of 2013.

“That compost pile looks like a dump.”

“But it’s so convenient.”

“I propose you move it.”

So, I pulled the posts, took down the wire walls, picked up the fetid, stinking pile of rotting food and moved it twenty-five feet down the hill to a new location where it could be screened behind a row of honey berries and thus made invisible to the farm’s inhabitants.

Now, twenty-five feet doesn’t sound like much in the grand scheme of things but the “dump” was now twenty-five feet closer to the woods, twenty-five feet closer to the storm water handling ditch, and, therefore, twenty-five feet closer to the rats. No longer did they have to venture across open terrain under the watchful eyes of eagles and coyotes. Now they could just scamper through the underbrush and dash from the ivy to the compost under the cover of an overhanging branch.

And scamper they did.

The first sign that things were not as they should be was the remarkably quick appearance of tunnel openings in both piles of compost. The piles became so much Swiss cheese within three weeks of the move. The second sign was that rat in the greenhouse. The third sign was another rat in the woodpile. The fourth was a rat on the patio. The fifth was the little baby rats.

I must say here that the rats in these parts have some odd tastes. It might be because of the refuse from the tree-hugger, free-range, grass-fed, antibiotic-free restaurants on Bainbridge has damaged their taste buds. Or that dining in the aftermath of the farmer’s market has resulted in too much granola and other artisanal foodstuffs in their diets. Whatever the reason, the rats here don’t eat all the things that rats elsewhere devour with glee. Top choice for catching rats: bacon. On Bainbridge the bacon will sit on the un-tripped trap until it is covered with maggots. Second choice: peanut butter. Not here, bucko. Peanut butter will fossilize before a BI rat would even so much as sniff it.

Nope. On Bainbridge Island the numero uno, most-desirable food as voted on by rats now two years running, is birdseed.

Have you ever baited a rat trap with seed? One wrong move and you’ll end up looking like you work in a Bangladeshi machine shop carving parts out of aluminum ingots for Apple.

Then there’s the collateral damage.

Last year’s rat-slash-gopher invasion culminated in the First Battle of the Greenhouse. Sadly, the micro-farm is home to a number of other desirable creatures which also enjoy birdseed – AKA: birds – which are able to access the greenhouse and nibble on millet until…

So I had to bird-proof the rat traps to keep this from happening.

Then they found the chickens.

Birds, by their nature, are two things: 1) filthy, smelly creatures, and 2) messy eaters. The chickens peck through their feed, spill most of it, go roost for the night, and the rats come in and clean up. While at first glance this may seem a valuable social service, in reality it just allows them to be happy, health, and fecund. Indeed, the rats we have seen have all had sleek pelts, a round profile, and the speed and agility of a decathlete.

And lots of kids.

At last count the rat census in and near the compost piles topped out at eight. And the battle was joined.

Which is when I started losing the war.

I set the rat trap, warily covering the trigger with chicken food and inverting a laundry basket over the thing to keep the birds and chickens at bay.

Bam!

Got a rat.

Reset the trap and…

…nothing.

I had to take a multi-day approach and feed the rats until they were expecting food in that location and then reset the trap.

Bam!

Got another rat.

Repeat the old bait and switch for another couple of days and…

…Bam!

Nothing.

The rats had figured out the scam and started throwing sticks and bits of compost at the trap to trip it after which they could dine in comfort and safety protected by the inverted laundry basket.

So, once again, I had to up the ante.

My most recent foray into rat extinction involved raising my game another ten notches all in one move. I took the rat trap…

…and turned it into a landmine.

Where the main rat highway leaves the woods it has to cross over a small hill of compost placed there by the rats. I excavate a trap sized volume of compost, place the trap in the hole, cover it with compost, and bait it. But before I can do any of that I had to set the trap.

You know those movies where the hero-slash-star is confronted with a bomb and predictably bad lighting? “Clip the RED wire,” cackles over the headset. The timer is almost at zero and the hero chooses…and then clips.

That’s what it feels like. One wrong move, one improper dusting of camo-compost cover, one errantly dropped legume and twelve milliseconds later: I’m off to Bangladesh.

So far – which is to say twice – it’s worked perfectly and I can still count to ten without taking off my socks. Tonight the tricky little monster is getting deployed to the front lines again. This time it’s getting set in the rain, which, as I write this, doesn’t sound like a particularly smart thing to do.

But smart’s not in it. This is a battle of wits, wire, and deception. Surrender is not an option.

Because, once again, there’s a rat on the patio.