awoke in the night with a sick feeling in my stomach
a familiar noise was inside the van
a rodent
an animal which had sought to inhabit my abode
and possibly ruin it as my home
I pounded on the part of the van where the noise
came from...and got little sleep in the process
it was a nocturnal invader so I was sure it was
not one of the white tailed antelope squirrels which
I saw daily...but I had seen a giant kangaroo rat
upon my first arriving at the campsite and had never
seen it again...I did not think one of them would
climb into the van...but I was pretty sure they were
nocturnal...whatever the species they had to be discouraged
from chewing on my van and the contents...when morning
came I dug out the three mousetraps and used some cheese
to bait the traps...I used to have a dozen trap which I had to
set nightly in Oregon...but I supposed that the mouse terror
was over with...little did I know...
and in the morning I saw the trap under the hood of the van
was without cheese...and the trap on the front floor-board
had been nibbled a little..and the trap behind the drivers seat
had the culprit...hopefully the only one...so now I have documented
three species of rodent at this desert campsite...the kangaroo rat
has yet to be phtographed
and the rains came twice...hard and fast...a flowering springtime
may come in the desert...and perhaps the caterpillers and moths
will emerge again...I will see
"We do not live to extenuate the miseries of
the past nor to accept as incurable those of
the present." Fairfield Osborn
Birupes simoroxigorum
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