Last Thursday, our newspapers came up missing. My husband usually picks them up from our driveway before he starts his morning walk. He was much later than usual in getting started that morning but, thinking the paper delivery person may also have been late, he took off. While he was out he noticed that several of our neighbors had papers in their driveways so, when he returned home, he did a thorough search of the bushes to see if he could find ours. He didn't and, assuming that the delivery person had simply missed us or that someone had walked off with them, we called in for replacements, which were promptly delivered. My husband asked if I could imagine that anyone in the neighborhood could have walked off with them and I shrugged and said it was just one of the two only plausible possibilities. We'd had papers "walk away" on numerous occasions at our former house but our present neighborhood is both less densely populated and more off the beaten track, so theft seemed unlikely. I sat down to my breakfast with the Los Angeles Times, while my husband took off with his Wall Street Journal, and I promptly dismissed the whole question. But, my husband, being curious, decided to check our security cameras. He quickly returned, urging me to come view the camera footage with the statement "you're never going to guess what happened."
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| The paper WAS delivered. I've circled it sitting at the bottom of our driveway. |
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| A mere minute or 2 later, a visitor strolls by and immediately checks out the paper, which was wrapped in a red plastic cover due to rain |
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| Yes, that's Mr. Coyote carrying off the paper |
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| It looked as though he was headed down the moss-covered dirt path just inside the hedge that borders the street |
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| But he apparently clambered up the stepping stones that lead up to the main level of the front garden. You can see him just to the left of the date stamp at the top of the screenshot. |
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| And another camera picked him up here rounding the bend into the garden on the south side |
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| At least he paid no attention to Pipig's screened porch on the right, although she was probably in the house yelling at me to dish out her breakfast at that point |
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| He retained a good hold on that paper as he trotted along |
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| This was the last good view we had of him |
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| Although a fourth camera picked up his movements along another dirt path in the back garden (roughly above the "01" in 2018 above), I couldn't get any decent screenshots from this view. However, I did find the missing papers another 20 feet or so beyond this point, where I suspect he abandoned them to dart through the hedge and down the slope into the canyon in search of other prey. |
For the record, I
did guess correctly in response to my husband's question but my response was in jest and I was incredulous when I saw the video, depicted here in selected screenshots from four separate cameras. I still can't fathom why the coyote chose to pick up the paper, much less carry it through the garden for two or more minutes. Maybe he was annoyed that I'd cleaned up the deposit he'd left in the driveway the morning before to mark our house as his territory. Or maybe he was irritated that I'd discouraged bunny visits to my garden by caging the plants they've been grazing on. Maybe he has an interest in what's happening in the stock market. Who knows!!!
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All material © 2012-2018 by Kris Peterson for Late to the Garden Party
