So, it's been a while. After no kills for months, I had the following bittersweet experience. I had been hearing a lot of activity in the attic for weeks but I hadn't seen any rats in the garage. Finally, I witnessed a rat scampering across the rafters in the garage and disappearing in his hole. The very next night I went out with my red mag light. Sure enough, I heard a sound in the corner. I swung around to find a juvenile rat balancing effortlessly on the rim of a file box that didn't have a lid on it. The thoughtful pest gave me plenty of time to line up my shot. After the pull of the trigger, the rat vanished. However, the sounds of rat death were emanating from the box. The tail whipping, the feet scratching, and the body thumping. It had fallen into the box and convulsed until death. I walked over to the box and looked inside. It was full of old paperbacks that my wife had kept from her childhood. They aren't sentimental or anything but she just hasn't gotten rid of them. I didn't see the rat though. So I started pulling books out in order to find my kill. Suddenly, I heard some scurrying in the box! A little grey rat leapt from the box and immediately climbed up into the rafters of the garage and escaped into the hole. My heart was pounding. "Was that the guy I just shot?" I wondered. I lifted the box up so I could set it down in the middle of the garage to search it. Suddenly, more scurrying! I promptly dropped the box as a profanity loudly escaped my lips. Another small creature climbed up and behind the pegboard. Since escape was not guaranteed, I readied my rifle. It poked its head out of the pegboard and then jumped onto a shelf. Pow! A pellet entered somewhere in its body. After falling to the hard pavement, it began a strange jerky run across the floor just to collapse under a table saw. I walked over to find it still breathing. A mercy shot to the head sent it three feet across the floor into the corner of the garage behind a bucket. I assumed it dead. After going into my house to get the digital camera, I searched the box to find the original victim. I snapped some good shots and then went over to the corner of the garage where my second victim lay. I pulled the bucket out of the way so I could take the photo. As I did so, I thought I saw a quick movement near the corner of the garage. When the bucket was moved, I noticed to my horror that there was no rat to be found. I heard scraping sounds behind the wall. It got away. Two .177 caliber pellets will surely kill it eventually. I haven't smelled it yet but I'm sure it's dead in the wall. So since I have no evidence of this kill, it will not be counted or documented. This brings me great sadness.
Needless to say, we threw that yellow book away.
R.I.P.