The Chippunk In The Basement

We have a chipmunk that lives under our front porch*.  He ate the snacks that I had in a basket for the delivery people that came to our house, and when I took those away, he tried to kill Ward, my plant that I had on the porch!!

So, we are on none too friendly of terms, but Billy thinks he's adorable.

Well, I was in the basement one day, and guess who I saw down there?  The chippunk.

Let me back up just a bit; I called out an exterminator earlier in the year, because a stone was knocked down from part of the old wall of the basement, and I thought it might be a racoon.

The exterminator said it was probably the chipmunk, then set bait in the trap, but no catch.  All seemed to be okay after that though, and the stone was the only one that fell, so it could have just been a coincidence.  ::sus::

But fast forward to last week: I saw him down there, and it was time to get.him.out.

We set up the trap again, this time using butterfingers, his apparent favorite candy to steal out of our Halloween candy stash in the basement.

He seemed to be just too quick for the trap.  Finally, Billy decided that he was probably too small for the cage, and was escaping through the sides. ahha!  

So, we went to Menard's and bought a 'small rodent' trap, but it only showed mice on the box, so we were not terribly confident in his capture with this, but it was the best they had.  For days it sat there, empty.

On Sunday, we went Tractor Supply Company and bought the "chipmunkinator."  (catchy right?)  Anyhow, by lunch the next day we had him!

Now, it was just a question of where do we take him?  I thought about it until Billy got off of work, then came up with messaging Zoey's mom.  She said they had bunches of chipmunks, and that he was welcome. = )

So, we loaded up everyone (of course) including the chipmunk.

Billy felt guilty that we were removing him, at what is practically the start of winter, so we bought 3 containers of peanuts to give him, and found a drawer to cover him, until he can make a home.

Once released, he didn't stay nearby to see what we would do to him next, so we didn't leave the drawer after all. 

Hopefully he found a new home and lots of friends before the cold weather set in.  And, I'm happy that he is no longer in the basement!

later days

*This guys, whom we call "FatCat" is still around, so he was not the one in the basement after all.