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What types of vermin do you encounter on your farm?
By: The Moo News Network
Interviewer: CowboyBenWade, what types of vermin do you encounter on your farm?
CowboyBenWade: Every farm has vermin; it doesn't matter how clean the farm might be. We would never tolerate an abnormal level of vermin at a farm like this, but it is something we deal with.
Interviewer: Do you mean rats?
CowboyBenWade: In some cases yes but not always. Rats are very common around grain bins, and we don't have any of those here. We do have field mice, and we're okay with field mice.
Interviewer: Do field mice cause any problems?
CowboyBenWade: Not that I've ever noticed, and that's possibly because their numbers have not gotten out of hand.
Interviewer: Are there other vermin that you encounter?
CowboyBenWade: The biggest problem we have are possums, and I don't just mean one possum. It's always a whole family of them, and they just eat everything around them and poop all over the place. Wood, plastic, an old tarp, any kind of thing that is nice - they just go to town. It looks like you took a chainsaw and started swinging it around.
Interviewer: Do they smell bad?
CowboyBenWade: A possum infestation is the most miserable smell you will ever experience being on a farm. Few things are worse than when the stench from a pig farm blows your way, but try sticking your face too close to a family of possums that have been staying a while.
Interviewer: What types of areas do possums like?
CowboyBenWade: If wood is stacked with a tarp over it or something like that - they like to get in between the stacks of planks. Sometimes you might have wood that is stacked on top of concrete blocks, and they like to get under it. They like tight spots that are hard for bigger animals to get into. A possum is small enough to wriggle between a few two-by-fours but anything that's big enough to eat a possum probably couldn't fit. That's really the deciding factor.
Interviewer: How do you deal with possums?
CowboyBenWade: We are fortunate here because of the large local owl population. Owls and possums are both nocturnal so that keeps them out and about at the same time, which is good. Generally we like to keep the numbers down to the point where we don't see them in the daytime. I looked out the window the other day and saw one walking across the field. Possums are creatures that, due to their nature, should generally try to limit people seeing them.
Interviewer: What do you mean?
CowboyBenWade: Well, if you were to casually look out your window and see a stray cat, maybe a deer, or even a turtle crossing the field, you wouldn't think anything of it. You'd be okay with something like that. But if you were to look out your window, and it's a possum out there walking around, you kinda feel like you ought to do something about that.
Interviewer: Are possums undesirables?
CowboyBenWade: I'm okay with the idea of there being possums on my land. But if I see one, then it's a different thing.
Interviewer: Do you feel the same way about any other animals?
CowboyBenWade: Some animals are okay to know about, but they should come out at night when nobody can see them.
Another big problem we have are the coons. Now they aren't a problem in the sense that possums are a problems. Coons live in the woods and come out mostly at night. But there's just so many of them, we've trapped lots of them but they just keep coming. It's different family every night, and they eat our livestock feed, and our deer feed, and they get into our grain bins. A coon can find it's way into just about anything.
Interviewer: What do you do when them after you trap them?
CowboyBenWade: I think I'm supposed to say that we take them off somewhere, and we do. It's always somewhere far away. We've got a holding cage that can fit about thirty coons, and we just put that on the trailer and haul it off about twenty miles away to a river somewhere.
Interviewer: Is that how you get rid of possums too?
CowboyBenWade: No we deal with the possum on the farm, and we generally don't have as many to do something with at one time. It's more manageable.
CowboyBenWade: Every farm has vermin; it doesn't matter how clean the farm might be. We would never tolerate an abnormal level of vermin at a farm like this, but it is something we deal with.
Interviewer: Do you mean rats?
CowboyBenWade: In some cases yes but not always. Rats are very common around grain bins, and we don't have any of those here. We do have field mice, and we're okay with field mice.
Interviewer: Do field mice cause any problems?
CowboyBenWade: Not that I've ever noticed, and that's possibly because their numbers have not gotten out of hand.
Interviewer: Are there other vermin that you encounter?
CowboyBenWade: The biggest problem we have are possums, and I don't just mean one possum. It's always a whole family of them, and they just eat everything around them and poop all over the place. Wood, plastic, an old tarp, any kind of thing that is nice - they just go to town. It looks like you took a chainsaw and started swinging it around.
Interviewer: Do they smell bad?
CowboyBenWade: A possum infestation is the most miserable smell you will ever experience being on a farm. Few things are worse than when the stench from a pig farm blows your way, but try sticking your face too close to a family of possums that have been staying a while.
Interviewer: What types of areas do possums like?
CowboyBenWade: If wood is stacked with a tarp over it or something like that - they like to get in between the stacks of planks. Sometimes you might have wood that is stacked on top of concrete blocks, and they like to get under it. They like tight spots that are hard for bigger animals to get into. A possum is small enough to wriggle between a few two-by-fours but anything that's big enough to eat a possum probably couldn't fit. That's really the deciding factor.
Interviewer: How do you deal with possums?
CowboyBenWade: We are fortunate here because of the large local owl population. Owls and possums are both nocturnal so that keeps them out and about at the same time, which is good. Generally we like to keep the numbers down to the point where we don't see them in the daytime. I looked out the window the other day and saw one walking across the field. Possums are creatures that, due to their nature, should generally try to limit people seeing them.
Interviewer: What do you mean?
CowboyBenWade: Well, if you were to casually look out your window and see a stray cat, maybe a deer, or even a turtle crossing the field, you wouldn't think anything of it. You'd be okay with something like that. But if you were to look out your window, and it's a possum out there walking around, you kinda feel like you ought to do something about that.
Interviewer: Are possums undesirables?
CowboyBenWade: I'm okay with the idea of there being possums on my land. But if I see one, then it's a different thing.
Interviewer: Do you feel the same way about any other animals?
CowboyBenWade: Some animals are okay to know about, but they should come out at night when nobody can see them.
Another big problem we have are the coons. Now they aren't a problem in the sense that possums are a problems. Coons live in the woods and come out mostly at night. But there's just so many of them, we've trapped lots of them but they just keep coming. It's different family every night, and they eat our livestock feed, and our deer feed, and they get into our grain bins. A coon can find it's way into just about anything.
Interviewer: What do you do when them after you trap them?
CowboyBenWade: I think I'm supposed to say that we take them off somewhere, and we do. It's always somewhere far away. We've got a holding cage that can fit about thirty coons, and we just put that on the trailer and haul it off about twenty miles away to a river somewhere.
Interviewer: Is that how you get rid of possums too?
CowboyBenWade: No we deal with the possum on the farm, and we generally don't have as many to do something with at one time. It's more manageable.
About the Author
CowboyBenWade does interviews and lectures on a huge variety of topics, and he is an expert in a multitude of fields. His knowledge includes but is not limited to: engineering, chemistry, aviation, cooking, and farming.
Much of the world is clamboring to interview him at any given time. This is a transcript of one such interview.