Why do you pest? Or not?

[rangur1]

No right or wrong on preference. I pest to obviously rid my yards of problem birds/ animals. Secondary benefit is the rebound of native song birds. Take away the pressure of imbalances created by man. Nature responds. So I do it for my personal quality of life. As well as for the song birds.

 

[Fixedflinger]

I have chickens so I regularly take out rats and chipmunks from the food area, if you do nothing about it then the critters will make a home nearby and multiply. The larger threats (although rare) are taken care of with a firearm.

 

[Firewalker]

I remove any pests that compete with our homestead. Groundhogs, chipmunks, starlings, crows, fox and yotes all get a lead injection. Survival of the fittest.

 

[madeintheuk]

I have chickens, so I’m constantly ridding the yard of chippers and squirrels. I also HATE holes in my lawn caused by digging.

My permission has an issue with red squirrels damaging his tree farm, and another permission has issues with grey squirrels taking the apples. I can’t say I don’t enjoy shooting critters, but at least I’m providing a service at the same time!

 

[eelect]

I clean up birds on dairy farms. Nothing is more entertaining than that

 

[Sqwirl57]

A 4 cent pellet is 500,000x cheaper than foundation damage caused be groundhogs. Squirrels don't really cause a huge issue but they have done some damage to my lawn furniture in the past and love knocking down my bird feeders. At least they used too. Haven't seen one of them beady eyed trouble makers in a month or two now. I'd be lying if I said I didn't like testing my skills as well. We put a lot of practice in so its nice to see it put to good use.

 

[qball]

Few thousand dollars in airguns and ammo is exponentially cheaper than roof repair let along collapsed rock wall. On top of that keeping me sane during pandemic was priceless!

 

[ram2jeep]

Chipmunks dig hole’s in my yard so they must go and the squirrels try to get in the attic and love to destroy cables and whatever else they can get in to. Had a chipmunk get into my central air unit and my a/c wouldn’t come on. Luckily my brother-in-law is an hvac/electrician and was over the house for dinner. It was getting hot so he went out to take a look and sure enough, dead chipmunk on the capacitor.
Also, chipmunks are on the year round kill list for MA.

 

[Ezana4CE]

I’m my experience pesting is done to usually protect someone’s property from preventable damage. It could be land, a waterway, crops, or livestock that need protection or riddance of nuisance animals.

 

[Mg616]

For the native birds. Addition by subtraction of invasive sparrows, starlings.

 

[Ranchibi]

Rats....one got into the home via doggy door and then a handful have gotten into the garage.....I signed a declaration of war on them since then! LOL!

 

[otis1016]

I have no need to deal with pests. The chipmunks don’t bother me, squirrels don’t either and while I live in a neighborhood and not out in the country we have a good supply of raptors that keep those problems under control. I enjoy watching them all while enjoying cold adult beverages now and then. The only pest problem I’ve had that got in the house was bats in the attic.

Rick H.

 

[hawkeye69]

I shoot invasive birds at dairies. I enjoy the challenge of shooting at constantly changing distances, angles and wind conditions. The fact that it serves a useful purpose is also a positive.

 

[WorriedMan]

Rangur,
I'm with you on the native songbird protection. Between Cat Lady feeding 15 feral/domestic cats twice daily, and a large crow population, the songbirds in my neighborhood were in a losing battle. I tried keeping the predators at bay with an old smoothbore Crosman 760 but offered no serious threat. Enter my PCP "addiction" and a huge coyote, that came out of the nearby swamp, now no more cats or crows to be found. Nature, with a little assist, found the balance. WM

 

[L.Leon]

To help out my farmer friends… I don’t shoot critters in my yard. Everything gets a pass other than rats and chipmunks. Unless it’s a legitimate pest, caught in the act? It gets a pass. At the farm all the critters coming in to steal feed? They get shot without mercy.

 

[Peashooter]

I do not as i live in a ultra bureaucracy.
So this mean if i where to be allowed to shoot a rat, i would need a pestiog education and permit, mostly based on using poison, which are NOT the means i would ever use.
It would also be nice if i would be able to make a little money to supplement my meager pension, but this is just another can of worms to open, cuz ultra bureaucracies need to be funded in one way, and this is generally the kind of stealing some call taxes.

 

[pdxFrank]

not. so long as they don't bother me, i won't bother them.

 

[harrymoreland]

With the exception of Rats ( Norwegian )
I pest to get and keep my permissions.
With the Rats, it's personal.

 

[DonaAna1]

The pests that are bothering me at the moment are protected.
My yard is over run by curved billed thrashers, and I have left them alone. Tough to do when every tomato is tasted before it is brought into the house. I did have a problem with ground squirrels last year as a pair raised a family under my shed. And gave my dogs stick tight fleas. They squirrels had to go.
I tried trapping, but, the thrashers loved the peanuts and peanut butter more than the squirrels did.
It is against regulations to shoot airguns in the city. And there is a school bus stop next door to the house.
It leaves very few opportunities. Covid the last two years contributed to the lose of ground squirrels though. I would have never guessed they were susceptible to it. But, somehow they disappeared. Of course with no kids at the bus stop?

 

[Mr.H]

I live in a rural area. Many homeowners have cats to help with the mice overpopulation. Unfortunately, cats, feral or otherwise, put a hurt on the bird population. A couple of years ago, a friend asked if I could come over to one of her properties which had a dozen or so feral cats which had located in the area. There is also a farmer I frequent from time to time to depopulate the pigeons.