Pest that needs to die!

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butlersrangers
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Re: Pest that needs to die!

Post by butlersrangers »

"I Bee awaitin"!

FredC
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Re: Pest that needs to die!

Post by FredC »

Not the one I had in mind, but the African honeybee is alien. So is the European honeybee for that matter. Most consider it to be beneficial.
Last edited by FredC on Fri Jun 03, 2022 6:59 pm, edited 1 time in total.

FredC
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Location: Dewees Texas

Re: Pest that needs to die!

Post by FredC »

There was a subtle clue about an alien that eats pests in there. This critter is nowhere near a peculiar as the armadillo,

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butlersrangers
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Re: Pest that needs to die!

Post by butlersrangers »

I'm waiting to be toad!

FredC
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Location: Dewees Texas

Re: These alien creatures do not need to die.

Post by FredC »

These beneficial critters do have wings. Road on a storm coming off the east coast of Africa in the 50s. Very beneficial as the major part of their diet seems to be grasshoppers. They walk along side cattle and pounce on the grass hoppers that fly up. Many times they are standing on the cows.


If you have not guessed it yet it is the cattle egret. There maybe a more exact name for them but that is what we know them as.
More cattle egret observation coming.

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butlersrangers
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Re: Pest that needs to die!

Post by butlersrangers »

I did not know about the Egrets from Africa. They sound a lot more useful than 'Florida's Pythons'.

Doubly Reincarnated
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Re: Pest that needs to die!

Post by Doubly Reincarnated »

Cattle egrets they are, even in the best of the birders' books. Many of them here in north coastal California when I came here in 1974. Numbers dropped off in the 1980s when environmental protection schemes forced the cattle ranchers off their low-lying, near sea-level pastures. They eat bugs, frogs, mice, etc. stirred up by the cattle as they move through a pasture. Haven't seen them locally for almost 30 years.

Ranchers here did not consider them pests. They didn't hurt anything.

FredC
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Location: Dewees Texas

Beneficial alien creatures

Post by FredC »

Once saw a flock of them line up across a field nd they proceded to march aros the field iin a line. The grashopper that bird B scared up would fly to the side and bird C would snatch it out of the air. The field was about 200 yards wide and a half mile long. They maintained that 200 yard long line all the way down the field. Previously the grass hoppers had eaten all the leaves off one of my apple trees 3 times, that final time they killed it. Sure was happy to see them egrets and the grass hoppers demise.

Had to buy a tire this morning and saw the attached paper on the counter. One fellow was still laughing at the joke when he got in his truck and forgot to put the nozzle back and drove off with it.

I had a discussion with the owner it is still the same. They do not make hardly anything when the prices are going up. When they are going down they get to catch up.
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FredC
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Location: Dewees Texas

Brown headed cow birds

Post by FredC »

Brown headed cow birds are native but their numbers have increased very much since the replacement of bison with cattle. Sometimes egrets are called cow birds by mistake. Unlike the egret that the ranch foreman next door said that he could not think of anything bad to say about them, the brown headed cow bird is something that few people can say anything good about them.

FredC
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Re: Pest that needs to die!

Post by FredC »

I killed 2 armadillos this weekend. I found just scanning an area with lights was missing armadillos out in the open. Used the thermal scope to find them at a distance and was able to walk up on and kill one with the Snake Slayer and 45 shot shell. The next one did not let me get close. Last night went out with the Ruger 10-22 with the StreamLight and the 45/70 with the thermal scope, it is a royal pain carrying two rifles, but I found another. I put the 45/70 down and walked up close enough for positive ID and shot it with the 22.

Looks like getting a handheld thermal scope will be the cat's meow dealing with armadillos. Should be easier than getting a Ruger Mark IV and fitting it with a
StreamLight and carrying the 45/70.

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