How to kill evil Nazi Groundhogs

Factual Questions
61

The benefit of the combustion engine exhaust is that it’s smell, bad as it is, won’t cause the 'hogs to run away from it like the poison smoke bomb. Carbon monoxide, once the other emissions have settled out of it will pool in in the upper varmint caverns. Being relatively odorless, the 'hogs will walk around in it, start getting drousy and then fall asleep – never to wake up again.

Also, you can keep the engine running for hours at a time, and repeat daily – something that the smoke bomb makes difficult.

Now, someone mentioned carbon dioxide in tandem with the carbon monoxide. I don’t know how much CO[sub]2[/sub] is produced in exhaust, but if not a lot is produced, you may want to consider finding some CO[sub]2[/sub] tanks and sending it into the tunnels. As has been said, the CO[sub]2[/sub] sinks and will pool in low spots. And it is completely odorless. So, unlike water, they’ll never know the dip in the tunnel is a death trap.

Also, you can get several cars, tractors, and whatnot all going at once all around the property. Remember, you need to keep this going for a few hours at a time, and maybe repeat a few times a week.

Peace.

62

I know a guy who goes, as he calls it, (hog-huntin’) with his pit bull. This dog is as nice as can be to humans, but you release this thing on a groundhog and it goes hog-wild. (Pun intended) But seriously, I’ve seen his dog tear into a groundhog, and it’s over pretty quickly. So what you need to do is get yourself a pack of pit bulls and set’em loose. It’s fun for the whole family.

63

You may also join rec.hunting or rec.guns and post questions there. They are mostly country folk who deal with varmits all day long.

64

Another idea…

I seem to remember seeing a mole chaser that uses a small windmill to shake the ground a little and make living there uncomfortable.

Now let’s upgrade this idea.

Build a windmill that will include two things to annoy the varmint. Let’s say we build a relatively mobile windmill that will turn with a small breeze. Now with using cogs or pulleys make an apparatus that will make some noise and that will hammer on a pipe or piece of metal that can be put in the ground (or on the ground) that will cause some slight vibration of the earth.

The noise should preferably imitate the sound of your rifle ( take a ruler and hit it against a piece of rubber etc. ). This does 2 things, first it scares them inot leaving (okay maybe one or two of them), second it makes them think this sound is naturally occuring and a normal part of their environment (heh, heh, target practice).

The vibration probably will bother them to begin with, then wear off. It will imitate the shaking of vehicles and hopefully cover your movements.

65

Jiminy! And people say us city folks are brave—all we have to deal with is insane cab drivers, muggers and the occasional mime or performance artist!

This is beginning to sound like “Night of the Lepus!”

66

Eve, there are two kinds of varmits: two-legged and four-legged. You live in an ecosystem that supports the two-legged variety. Alsmith lives where the four-legged are predominate.

67

how 'bout freezing their little punk asses? i’ve never tried this myself, but the vapor from liquid nitrogen sinks to the ground. so go out there in the winter (i assume they hibernate deep in their burrows) and start pumping N2 down their holes. they might get up to grab a few extra blankets, but hopefully they won’t really notice the extra chill until it’s too late. come spring, you can dig up a bunch of hogsicles.

ellis

68

The exhaust gas idea works, and it doesn’t take a tractor or truck or bus. Just a little ole leaf blower.
My “gopher getter” was used successfully by a dairy farmer to rid his fields of groundhogs.
First thing to do is disassemble and remove the muffler from the leaf blower. You then use conduit to pipe the exhaust to within 2" of the blower intake.
Stick the blower outlet into the groundhog tunnel and seal around it. Cover and seal as many of the other holes as you can find. Start up the blower, and using the trigger lock set it to run at about half throttle.
You may then wait to see what happens, or go to dinner, whatever you please.
The CO produced by the engine is almost completely blown into the tunnel system, and there will not be a tractor or other vehicle requiring supervision. Not being able to afford CO detectors, the groundhogs will usually expire from being in a closed space with engine exhaust present.
You may go out and refuel the blower as many times as it takes to completely load the tunnel system with the deadly gas.
I originally designed the machine to eliminate some moles that made my lawn look like something out of a bugs bunny cartoon, but found that it works for anything that resides below ground.

FixedBack

“A dead thing can go with the stream, but only a living thing can go against it.”~~*G.K.Chesterton *

69

N orJVI al:

Thank you for your suggestion. Your theory that my liking of Barry Manilow’s music has somehow angered the Gods of Rock and Roll and that I must undergo ritual cleansing in order to remedy the situation was very insightful.

Unfortunately you are wrong Because:

A: Barry Manilow Rocks (he writes the songs that make the whole world sing,) and

B: Even if he dosn’t (perish the thought) I somehow suspect the Gods of Rock and Roll would choose something other than Groundhogs as their vehicle of vengeance. I mean if it was Menudo digging holes in my fields I might agree with you, but Groundhogs?

Pundit:
Thank you again, for another excellent suggestion. I am certain however that electricity as you’ve described it wouldn’t work (actually it would, but we are talking enough juice here to power a city block.) I have an electric fence and some knowledge of things electrical, so let me explain.

Lay an electrical fence wire on the ground, turn the fence on, and stand between the wire and its “ground” post. Feel anything? Nope.

Now hook the wire back back up and turn the fence on and grab the wire!

You are now on the ground doing what the locals call the “Funky Chicken.” This by the way is considered great fun around here.

“Come here I want to show you something in the pasture”

“Okay, is the fence on?”

“No, look.” He climbs through.

“Oh okay” Starts to climb throuh, accomplice lurking by switch turns fence on. Funky Chicken.

This is how the neighbors welcome the new guy who just moved down here from the city :wink:

The thing is, when you grab the fence you are the only conduit to ground. You get hit with 100% of the juice. If you just pass it through the ground it gets diluted very quicky.

There is a “bug zapper” type contraption that I saw on the net for rats. Too small for hogs though.

Funnefarmer:

Your suggestion of Fellatio Interruptus Castration is far to horrible to contemplate.

AHA:

Though it’s not in the archives here, (that I could find) I recall an article by Cecil debunking the use of Sonic repellents against rodents, and I’m not about to argue with him.

Boris B:

Yes these are GROUNDHOGS. MARMOTA MONAX. Not moles,mice,hamster,squirrel,chipmunk,shrew, nor wombat,vole,lemur,Opossum, or finch. They are the same vicious bastards that were responsible for Bill Murray’s troubles in GROUNDHOG DAY and CADDYSHACK both (and don’t tell me that’s coincidence!)

The silenced .300 sniper-rifle you provided a link to looks very cool. Again I can’t believe That I can by Sniper rifles and Strychnine coated seeds over the internet. Kind of scary. Now, who was that guy who called us “Goofs?”

I am not using giant lightning rods! It could take years for a strike.

The windmills might work, but that’s getting kind of silly.

While your dog may be tough, mine have learned that Wisdom is the better part of valor as far as messing with Groundhogs goes, and have become sissies.

I think flooding will be difficult because the Groundhogs tunnel vertically and create chambers that would form air pockets. You would need to flood them long enough to use up the oxygen. I have a couple of 55 gallon drums a pickup and a garden hose. That ain’t gonna cut it.

The idea of pouring liquid manure down their holes so that the have to swim through **** in order to escape only to have their ****ing heads get blown off by me, waiting at the exit with a shotgun does have a certain appeal.

I have no access to liquid nitrogen and would hate to kill myself figuring out how to pour it down a hole.

Eve:

I used to live in NYC and all I can is that at least the Groundhogs won’t take your wallet, or shoot back. Yet.

Converting a leafblower into a groundhog euthanasia device sounds like an excellent idea. I was wrong to have dismissed exhaust gas out of hand because of my bad experience with Smoke bombs. I will try this if the Juicy Fruit and seeds doesn’t work.

If that doesn’t work I will launch a concerted multi-pronged attack in early spring in an attempt to decimate their ranks before they breed and spread.

While I might not be able to muster a horde of ruthless teenaged Marmot bounty-hunters armed with autoloading, and silenced sniper rifles (and would have second thoughts about having them run around what is essentially my back yard.) I should be able to put something together.

If that doesn’t work I will get the Hog-sucker, build a windmill, Freeze some nitrogen and drink myself into a permanent stupor.

As far as posting at rec.hunters or something as has been suggested, well do you think they would have come up with Juicy fruit, Liquid Nitrogen, or electroshock therapy?

Thanks again, will post results as I have them.

70

Cheap supply of liquid Nitrogen delivered to you directly can be found by contacting your local artificial inseminator. Frozen sperm (we’re talking bull here, get your heads out of the gutter) requires a tank with liquid Nitrogen to keep frozen. Artificial inseminators and sperm salesmen (gives new meaning to cold calling for customers, hey?) usually deliver liquid nitrogen relatively inexpensively.

71

How about liquid ammonia fertilizer? Not so much to freeze them as to poison them or drive them out.

72

or if you added desil to it you could blow them all to hell…oaklahoma city style.
eggo

73

Greatest thread I have ever read. All I ever did was to shoot the little bastards. I favor the idea of exhaust fumes from a gasoline engine. But that means a lot of energy going to waste. Couldn’t you use a sawmill or two? Or a new well that requires a pump? At least get some use from the motive source other than death, although that is satisfying.

74

Alsmith-

Lets expand on the gas idea. Use a gas that is flammable but not combustible. Or a heavy gas. As some of us have seen matresses and furniture and household items create a thick “toxic” smoke about 12 inches of the ground. Other light toxics and smoke tend to be higher in the layers. Thats why people are advised to crawl out of fires but not to be too low to the ground.

Turns out the “low” level toxics are more deadly but arent as hot as high level gasses and smoke.

Use a heavy flammable gas and after it has been present for 5 hours or so (giving time to fill most spaces and be inhaled by rodentia) give it a match. A blue flame should be seen (like propane or low level heat) that should “chase” the gas trail. The flame will use all O2 thus suffocating some rodents if not all. The flame should incinerate some more (the inhaled gas in the lungs being flammable should internally roast a few too). Now you have a three pronged attack against an embedded or entrenched enemy.

Thank the army not me. Chemical weapons are mans biggest miscreation.

-G

PS mustard gas works too and is easy to make.
Chlorine bleach and ammonia used through a “fogger” are wonderful too.

75

For a gas attack, exhaust fumes are good, at least in theory. Carbon dioxide (the main component of the exhaust, along with water vapor) will sink into the lower holes because it’s heavier than air. This will asphyxiate any groundhog who doesn’t move into a higher chamber. However those that do will run into carbon monoxide, which is lighter than air and poisonous (people who run their car in a closed garage find this out the hard way). The only option for beasts is to leave the tunnels, in which case you’re standing around with your rifle.

–It was recently discovered that research causes cancer in rats.

76

“I somehow suspect the Gods of Rock and Roll would choose something other than Groundhogs as their vehicle of vengeance. I mean if it was Menudo digging holes in my fields I might agree with you, but Groundhogs?”

hehehehehe … you do have a good point there.
Maybe you need to play Alvin and the Chipmonks, backwards.

okay, okay… I’ll try to be serious.
I read on one of the posted links, that they don’t like to get very far from their den, to feed. I’m not sure what’s growing in the area now, but you might want to consider an alternate crop.
I would suggest marijuanna. They will eat it. (trust me)
It shouldn’t take very long for them to become so useless that they just sit around all day, pondering the secrets of the universe, enstead of digging.
… no digging… no problem

… well hey, I said I would try to be serious … it’s just so hard …

77

Al,

I think perhaps your real problem is that you may have misidentified its cause. IF the root of your problem were that the woodhogs, groundchucks, etc., quote breed prodigiously unquote then guns ‘n’ gas would sound like a good solution.

But I think that you unkowingly put your finger on it in your 1/9 1:11am post: you’re the New Guy From The Big City around there. The ag people sent you on your way, no doubt snickering behind your back…your neighbors see your suit and fall silent…only your renters are “helpful and nice.” Uh huh. Look around! Do THEY have whistle pig problems? I thought not!

It’s obviously a plot. Everyone is just waiting for you to give up and go back to the Big City. Your renters are even profiting from paying you less rent - and everyone is getting all that free entertainment. I’m sure that almost all of those Poor Richard’s Wolverines are planted; they may even be paying them! It’s so obvious!

So here’s what you do: make friends. Throw a big banquet or something, get some overalls, maybe muss some hay into your hair, but mostly jest gitcherself accepted. Overnight you’ll find that this nightmare will end, and the gophers will go back to whatever temp agency they work for.

Y’all’ll get a good laugh from it, years from now, 'specially when some other slicker tries to move into the county and YOU do the same thing to HIM.

78

you can get liquid nitrogen from industrial/medical gas supply companies. the one in my area (northern vermont) is merriam-graves (http://www.merriam-graves.com). according to the site, they have 15 locations in the north east.

enjoy

ellis

79

hey, al, altho you poo-pooed my first suggestions (& later decided they weren’t so bad when one of the GUYS re-suggested the same stuff–not that i’m intimating gender bias or anything), i had another thought between giggles after {:-Df’s post. (currently being a redhead instead of a blonde, i often get 2 or 3 thoughts in a row. honest.)

what do your neighbors do about this prob in their fields? assuming they aren’t actually peeking out from behind the trees & also giggling. knowing for sure that you were the only city slicker around &, therefore, they were safe only in your fields seems a bit high level even for such obviously devious rodents. the groundhogs i mean, not your neighbors.

80

I have wronged thee. Will you forgive me. I dismissed your idea not out of gender bias, but because of a bad assumption: That the awesome destructive force of Hadagopher was A Priori Inherently superior to what comes out of an exhaustive pipe. Much to my chagrin it has been demonstrated to me that this is not the case, hence my retraction and apologies.

My neighbors almost exclusively shoot their groundhogs. THose that are familiar with my property tend to agree that I am unusually plagued with the foul varmints, and I have found shooting insufficient.

Perhaps my property represents some kind of Groundhog Mecca? I don’t khow. My fields are gently sloping and are surrounded by woods and two ponds. Alfafa is currently planted in the fields. It is my understanding that this combination is “HOG HEAVEN”

Again my apologies. I stand humble and corrected. You were indeed the first to make the suggestion.