Groundhog
 

Today I had a little surprise, I was sitting in the living room today looking out the window. Thinking what a pretty day but that wind was blowing so hard it was alittle too cool. We live in the country anyway I thought I had seen something move so I kept watching it was coming up off the road into the yard. Accross from our yard is alot of brush it's part of the farm acreage there. So low and behold at first I thought it looked like a cat or even a raccoon but it was a ground hog it was carrying something in her mouth. Guess what it was. that's right a baby, it was pretty good size and she wasn't that big so she was young too. I couldn't believe it . So she goes and disappears underneath the old building that we use as a wood shed. I kept watching and next here she goes again back the same way scurrying accross the yard and I prayed she wouldn't get hit . That road is awful busy too. I waited and watched about 7 mins. and here she comes again lol I thought how cute carrying another baby. She did it one more time but when she started to cross the road she got half way a car was coming and she made it back to the side she was coming from. I have to say she was a smart little mother she would stay there until there was no sounds or cars and then she finally came accross, she ran with it this time and put it underneath and then came out and stood staight up and kept watch for a minute. I have never in my whole life ever seen a groundhog do that. It made my day seeing something that cute. I thought I'd share this with yous.

Cheryl

And people say that animals don't think. I think they do, don't you?

I'm happy her relocation was a safe one. I just can't stand to see an animal killed on the road.

How sweet thanks for posting!

We found a rabbits nest about 5 ft inside our one pony yard! Newborns! A bunch! What to do to keep them safe? I got out a couple of plastic fence line post and ran some mesh hot line from the main line, around the posts, and back to the main line on the other side. Ponies are going to wonder why they can't get into that rectangle of their yard but the bunnies should be safe. We found them only because when I went down to feed the momma was feeding them and poppa was on the look out. Since no one is allowed to chase them the rabbits around here just sit within touching distance and just look at us like we are their caretakers and what are you going to do to keep us safe? We also have a little banty hen sitting on a GOOSE EGG! And people wonder why we call our place the funny farm! LOL

Oh, I KNOW they do! And many times they do a much better job of it than we do... LOL!

"Mother's intuition" crosses all species, don't you think?:) Sweet story, I could just visualize it as I read your post.

Jan in VA

What happyiness to watch wild critters take care of their own. We have Eastern bluebirds who are raising their 2nd set of babies. Sometimes the first set of babies help with the second set. Animals are just nifty.

We also live in Maryland on the upper eastern shore. We have a ground hog living under our garden shed. This the second year that we have seen her or him. He loves to stand up and take Quince from our quince tree. We have baby rabbits and also the second brood of finches in a hanging basket on the front porch. I feel as though I am running a maternity hospital.
They all provide us with lot's of entertainment. Humming birds are just starting to come to our feeder and also to the
Mimosa tree just outside of our big window.

Awe, how sweet!

they cant tell me animals dont think.My Poo-Chie was only 9 weeks old when I saw her figure out how to get from the bed to me where i was sitting in my office chair doing some quilting. she first tried putting her front paws on the quilt frame but that left hind legs on bedside and left her hanging as she was too far away to risk jumping from bedside to quilt frame. she retreated and sat there for a few minutes looking around. then she ran to the end of bed where I had left a box of pretzels i had been nibbling . She used her nose to push the box into position at the side of the bed and started to push if off. Since the open box was coming first i was afraid she would dump pretzels all over,I reached out my hand to catch the box. the minute my hand was under the box to support it, she jumped on the box and scurried across to the quilting frame and of course to me. My son was lying on the bed and was amazed. "if I hadnt seen it with my own eyes, I'd have never believed it" was his reaction.

Thanks for sharing, I love this story, it made my day.

Thanks for sharing.

My ground hog (wild) was so cute, with her mouth full of new cut grass. We didn`t know where she was headed. O.K. we found out later when it got cold and snowy out. And then came spring.!! She had made her home under our wrap-a-round porch. Must have been nice to have a warm furnace pipe to sleep by. So sad to say, for some reason she passed away near the furnace pipe and did we have a sticking mess to live in for months. Yes she had an openning to come and go, but we were told a ground hog wants 2 openings, one to go in and one to go out. she must have planned on making an other one but couldn`t get it done.

When we lived in the city of North Little Rock, AR, we had a mother ground hog and her two little ones living under our storage building. We could sit on our deck about 15 ft. off the ground and watch them eat the young grass shoots and they loved my husbands tomatoes. He finnally built a mesh fence around his veges. We lived close to a huge, wooded city park and saw more wild life in our yard than we ever saw out camping.

Thank you for this sweet story . We live in the country and enjoy the groundhogs, chipmunks. birds etc. and our domestic animals. Lots of entertaining things they give us.

I thought they were cute when they ate grass and dandelions, but when they ate all my tulips, I stopped liking them. My husband has tried to get rid of them for YEARS. Fortunately, they don't eat narcissis or daffodils, but I really miss the color of all the tulips I used to have.

That is so great that you saw her doing that and you shared with us. I have never seen a groundhog except on TV! How fortunate for you. Thanks for posting.

They also eat holly hocks and broccoli. Fences don't stop them. I've seen them climb trees for mulberries.

I just found out two nights ago who it is that lives under my shed! Yes, it is a groundhog. Probably a pretty happy one, because he/she has about four or five entrance holes.

Any garden damage, I have chalked up to the deer, because things tend to be munched at least 12" off the ground.

Do you think this groundhog would be responsible for the holes in my lawn, probably about 100' away from the shed? We had an ancient - and huge - cottonwood poplar tree which we had taken down quite a number of years ago. And the roots are still rotting out, and where they were the lawn is just chock full of holes. But I never see the critter(s) who have done the excavating.

Thanks for the wonderful story.

We really enjoyed reading it.