Date: 5/15/25 6:49 am From: Fred Kaluza <fkaluza...> Subject: Re: [birders] Time for Thinking Caps
Thanks Janet. I’m thinking I’ll have to do the same. Meanwhile I wrote to the “sales and marketing” team at “Behren’s” who makes a lot of the cans that are sold around here. Three days and still no response. In the meantime…The Raccoons didn’t always bother my cans. They “learned” about it. This reminded me of the story of the old man and the kids. I figure maybe I can “un-learn” these Raccoons. There was an old man who loved his manicured lawn. One day he noticed tracks over the corner where the sidewalk ended as he was the last house on his street with an elementary school nearby. He became aware it was kids crossing his lawn as a short-cut to the school playground. He put up “keep off the lawn” signs to no avail so one day he confronted them and said he wanted to play a trick on his wife and asked if they would keep taking the shortcut for a dollar a day. They happily obliged for a week. After that, he told the kids it was going well and that his wife was really angry but he could only afford to pay them a nickel a week. At that, they refused to continue participation and his lawn grew back nicely. The real story is worded better but you get my point. What I did last night was take the cat-kibble bag out of the trash can but left a cup of kibbles in there. Tonight I’ll leave 1/2 a cup. Each night I’ll leave progressively fewer kibbles until at last I’ll leave 1, then none. Perhaps they’ll recognize diminishing returns and decide all the effort and noise just isn’t worth it. We’ll see.
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From: Janet Hinshaw <jhinshaw...>
Sent: Wednesday, May 14, 2025 4:50:31 PM
Cc: Fred Kaluza <fkaluza...>; Birders <birders...>
Subject: Re: [birders] Time for Thinking Caps
My husband fixed our raccoon problem with this. Back side has chain fastened to can and lid. Front side has the clip. To open you can swing the lid up and sideways so it hangs down while you are getting seed. This low cost solution is the only way we have been successful, even chains from handles and running under the lid handle wasn’t tight enough to prevent raccoons from squeezing into the can.
[image0.jpeg][image1.jpeg][image2.jpeg]
Janet Hinshaw
Sent from my iPhone
On May 8, 2025, at 11:58 AM, Dody Wyman <dody...> wrote:
I can’t remember where I got this, but it was a couple of decades ago! It takes only a little effort to force the handle to lock the top in place. I’ve never had anything break into it. I’ll poke around and see if I can find one online… If they made them “back then”, and it still works for me, “they” must be still making them…
Dody
<IMG_0746.jpeg>
On May 8, 2025, at 10:46 AM, Su Clift <coffeebeansu...> wrote:
On May 8, 2025, at 10:33 AM, Fred Kaluza <fkaluza...><mailto:<fkaluza...>> wrote:
Any ideas here? For years I’ve been a proponent of storing seeds and nuts and “Crow-Kibbles” in galvanized trash cans outside. Put a little silicone caulk around the places where the lids and sides are pierced for handles and they make nice solid (if not attractive) storage bins. They don’t rust for a long time and can’t be chewed-through but…I accidentally left the lid off of one of them last week and about a dozen squirrels exploded out of there when I approached in the morning. The worst part was that a Raccoon had learned that this is where I keep “his” food. Since then it’s been a battle to keep him from standing on his hind legs and pushing the lids off at night. He’s gotten to the point where he can force cinder-blocks off! I don’t want him to get hurt so I need a better idea. I can’t believe no one sells metal trash cans with locking lids. I’ve used bungee cords in the past only to find them chewed-through. For the last week I’ve lined-up the cans (6 of them) side by side and rotated the lids so I can slide 10’ sections of concrete reinforcement rods through all the handles at once but it takes about six of them, is a real pain and will eventually scrape off the Zinc and they’ll start rusting. Maybe I have to bring them all into the garage or…build some huge bin with a hinged lid? I could probably scrounge enough pallet-wood and go with that idea. Might be a good project to do with the grand-kids this summer. What do I do in the meantime?
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