OT Maybe..... Raccoons

On Feb 24, 5:54?pm, Dave Smith wrote:

For those who know how to properly prepare wild game for eating:

http://www.backwoodsbound.com/zracoon.html

I've never cooked it myself, but when I told a friend about a huge
trash-can dumping pest that was plaguing my neighborhood, he told me
"shoot the damn thing and bring it to my house right away. I'll show
you what to do with it" Well, I couldn't pass up a new experience like
that, so I did.

It rid the neighborhood of a nuisance and it tasted just fine. A dark,
loose grained meat that was similar to pulled-pork, but different.
Rich flavored and quite good. If the fat is removed prior to cooking,
it radically decreases the gamy taste, he told me. What he prepared
was as good as any stewed pork I've ever eaten.
 
Sky wrote:

Here in Chicago metro we see plenty of dead raccoons on the side of the
road. It was that way with possums when we lived in Los Angeles metro.
Moving into an urban area allows wild animals to thrive but it's a
different envornment requiring different instincts. I figure when the
first family moves in the safer location allows them to breed rapidly
but the different environment kills plenty. That will definitely drive
evolution rapidly.

We also hear a lot of coyotes. We rarely see any. I've seen I think
4-5 in 6 years here plus a couple caught on camera that made it to the
news. My ears tell me there are thousands that I hear but never see.
They are obviously better adapted to avoiding humans than raccoons but
they probably had a better start being farther along the
omnivore/predator spectrum towards predator.

Among the rodents squirrels and rats have ben living among humans for a
long time but lately I've seen a muskrat and a few beavers. Yep,
beavers right there in the city living in drainage ponds and cutting
down any bush that is not protected by a chain link fence.

One time we had a skunk dig a nest under our steps. We hired an
exterminator who used a trap and then buried a grate under the steps to
keep digging critters from coming back.

As humanity expands into the wild, critters are moving into our cities
and then seeing heavy evolutionary pressure to hide from humans. There
must be a lot of critters around that I can't see.
 
On Feb 25, 6:20?pm, Omelet wrote:


You must not eat pork then. If you buy some pork at the place you most
love to get it from, put it into a baggie and seal it. Lay it on a
counter at room temp for 48 hours and you'll see lots of live little
things crawling out of the meat and wiggling at you. Same with almost
any meat today unless its been treated to kill the parasites like most
sushi meat. I freeze my sushi meat at minus 25F for a week before
eating it. That will kill any parasites that are in the fish.
 
Re: 49ade2ba-2df9-41e2-b905-2acc737ea21a@o14g2000prb.googlegroups.com

ImStillMags wrote:


So we're not the only country where at some point in the past someone
thought it would be nice to bring in a foreign species.

Think about the bazillions of starlings found nationwide. Those all started
from 200 birds released in Central Park in New York early in the 20th
century by a society which thought it would be nice if all the birds
mentioned in Shakespeare could be found in the park. Durr.

MartyB
 
Re: [email protected]

Cheryl wrote:


Yeah, I play those bird calls once in a while to mess with my cats, or even
throw the porch door open and trick a bird once in a while.

However there are native American sparrows. The ones which are not are
classified as Old World Sparrows. There is a Eurasian Sparrow which lives
only around St. Louis. It's another one of those "helpful" introductions.
But for some reason they never spread much beyond St. Louis.

Cornell Labs and associated sites are great for digging up this kind of
info:
http://www.birds.cornell.edu/Page.aspx?pid=1478
 
On 2011-02-26, Nunya Bidnits wrote:


It's my understanding the same is true of pidgeons, brought over from
France as a food delicacy. Since we don't regularly eat pidgeons,
here, we're now overrun by them.

nb
 
On 2011-02-27, Nunya Bidnits wrote:


None of that log-in-book silliness ...yet. I'm still enjoying jes
watching them.

A few weeks ago I got to watch 2 drake and 4 hen Common Mergansers
doing their thing in a near frozen over river. Not only is the
concept of a frozen river new to me, but seeing these birds diving
under the ice for their food in a no-big-deal business-as-usual manner
was a delightful revelation. I love watching them.

I don't have good cameras, yet, but have a couple pairs of high
quality binoculars and an awesome view. I'm learning to slow down and
pay attention. ;)

nb
 
"Nunya Bidnits" wrote:

Pigs, cows, sheep, deer, and honey bees are my favorite critters imported
into the US. Plants and weeds are far worse than animals for changing our
environment. Zebra mussels and the Asian Carp are changing the nature of
the Great Lakes. The next major change in our environment are the
Engineered food crops, next might be engineered animals.

--
Enjoy Life... Nad R (Garden in zone 5a Michigan)
 
On 2011-02-27, Nunya Bidnits wrote:

I recently realized I haven't seen anything for 3 mos. Four days ago, saw
a handfull of small birds. At this alt, when they're gone for the
Winter, they're REAL gone.

nb
 
On 25/02/2011 8:51 PM, notbob wrote:



The pigeons seem to be like raccoons. They thrive in the city but you
don't see that many in the country. The only pigeons I see around here
those that on of our neighbours keeps.
 
Nunya Bidnits wrote:



I do the same thing to mine, what good is having a cat if you can't
torment it? Harr. But this is weird: I have a lion beanie baby on my
desk (long story) and I played a lion roar for her. She didn't sniff the
speakers, she went over and checked out the lion. Okaaay.


Geez, poor sparrows, I never paid much attention to them, never
looked them up in the bird book. There are so many types, I'll
have to be more observant.

nancy
 
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