On any given night deer, opossums, skunks, raccoons, foxes, coyotes, and armadillos may visit your yard. Did you know that all but the last two named animals are native to this area?

One morning recently, our flower garden appeared to have been rooted up by a hog. It was unbelievable destruction as plants and bulbs had been uprooted and trenches had been dug throughout the pine mulch and flowerbeds.

I then realized that the flower garden was not the only thing that had been damaged. Our centipede lawn had holes dug throughout it and the grass had been pulled from the ground in chunks. I quickly came to the conclusuion that a non-native armadillo had visited our yard.

I had seen dead armadillos in the road near our house but had not seen a live armadillo in our area. Armadillos are an animal that does its damage mostly during the nighttime hours. Sometimes they are seen at dawn and at dusk but for the most part, they are a creature of the night.

I immediately went to the Internet to find out how I could eliminate this armadillo or maybe armadillos. I knew as a last resort I could use my shotgun but I did not want to spend half the night waiting for the armadillo to show up.

 I found out that trapping them with a trap was a good way but surprisingly a baited trap would not work. Apparantly they are not attracted to any type of bait even a container of worms and grubs which is their staple food. Supposedly, the armadillo has poor eyesight and will follow a constructed funnel right into the trap.

You just have to design a funnel out of boards and they will walk right into the trap. Sounded to easy but off I went to buy some lumber to build a funnel. Using some 2 x 6 lumber, I built a funnel that was wide at one end and narrowed at the mouth of the steal trap.

I placed the funnel and trap in a spot where the armidillo had excavated on several occasions. The next morning I hurried outside to see if I had successfully caught the critter but the trap was empty. The armidillo had dug in the area but had failed to follow the tunnel into the trap.

Night after night, I had no success and the armadillo kept excavating the flowerbed and my yard. I knew the armadillo had a burrow somewhere close by but I had looked without success on adjacent property. I figured the armadillo was coming into my yard from the woods where its burrow must be located.

Then late one night my next-door neighbor called me about 10:30 and said he saw an armadillo walking in my yard between our houses. He indicated he had a loaded 410 shotgun, so I told him I would grab a spotlight and meet him outside and maybe we could finally eliminate the critter that was bulldozing my yard.

We saw the armadillo as he went under my wooden walkway and then it disappeared. Finally, I was able to locate the armadillo with my spotlight and the neighbor took a shot but it did not seem to phase the armadillo as it went back under my walk. Later I would learn that the 410 shotgun was loaded with number 9 shot that likely bounced off the armadillo’s armor plated body.

I began to look under my walk and to my amazement; I found the armadillo’s den. The critter’s den was right under my walkway! Talk about being convient, the sucker was right under my nose the entire time. I surmised it was still in its nice little condominium it had built under my walkway so I decided to toss a little gasoline into the hole and when I did, the armadillo exited the hole so quick that my neighbor could not get off another shot.

The gasoline must have gotten next to the armadillo because it crashed into a concrete pillow supporting my neighbor’s deck but then it managed to escape his yard undaunted except from being light headed from the gasoline. We did not see the armidillo or the damage from its nightly visits for a couple weeks and then it returned.

I had filled the burrow under my walk with dirt and rocks and there was no sign that it tried to return to that spot. I did find another spot under my deck where it had tried to dig a burrow but it ran into concrete and gave up the dig. Now it is two weeks later and the armadillo has not returned. I still have the tunnel and trap set but I think I will have to resort to something more lethal if it returns.

Armadillos are not a protected species and can be harvested year-round. Some people apparently think the armadillo is good table fare. During the great depression, armadillos were known as “Hoover Hogs” by Americans who had no choice but to eat them. President Hoover promised a “chicken in every pot”, but it turned out to be an “armadillo in every pot”. I think I will stick to chicken.

The armadillo has migrated into Georgia from Florida and can be found even in Georgia’s northern counties. Unfortunately, the non-native armadillos are here to stay and their numbers are increasing in Georgia, so do your part, and please harvest a few. See you next week.

Outdoor columnist Bobby Peoples can be reached via e-mail at brpeoples@windstream.net.