The mystery bird

[saanen]

One of the first things I do when I get home from work, after feeding Jasper and giving him fresh water, is go upstairs and change out of my work clothes. I keep my clothes in the master bedroom upstairs even though I sleep on the sleeper sofa in the living room. Anyway, today I hung my dress up and went into the bathroom to pull on a t-shirt and

Comments

[lertulo]

We had a bat mysteriously appear in that same house.

Took two weeks to discover the means of entry: turns out it's a flaw (an intentional one?) in the double-hung window design.

To open the window, one typically unlocks it then slides the bottom half upwards. But it turns out that the TOP half of the window is NOT secured in place--the only things holding it up there are friction and that lock.

After 90 years, the lock is really the only thing doing that work--friction doesn't work too well after the house has settled and gathered dust for so long. So as soon as you unlock a window, it's possible that the top half of the window has slid downwards.

In our case, one of the windows in the master bedroom had in fact slid downwards by about a foot--which, we think, was the bat's doorway.

[saanen]

Ah, but I thought of that and looked at all the windows. It looks like they're all shut firmly at the top too. Maybe I missed one. Stupid bird.

[tharain]

Couple of possibilities: Fireplace chimney. If the the flu isn't closed and the chimney doesn't have a screen cap, all sorts of things get in. Think Tippy Hedren and The Birds. I had a squirrel get down my chimney in my fifties ranch. The story of how I eventually got it out was...most amusing.

Also, re: bats and flying things: they can get in holes or flaws in the eaves, and then come in the main part of the house from the attic. I had a bat in my old victorian back east (me, screaming like a girl, running down the hall to get away from a bat which had a wingspan that crossed the hall: not pretty, but very, very funny).

[saanen]

Since there's no chimney and no flue (unless it's closed up and hidden quite well--possible, since it's an old house), I have to discount the chimney possibility. I'm thinking the eaves/attic is a more likely event, since I double-checked all the windows this morning and they're all closed at the top.

When I was in high school, we had a bat get in my mom's room. I remember her shrieking, and when I ran to see what was going on there was a little bat flying around and around and around her room. I like bats, but they do look really weird when they're flying--sort of like remote control toys.

And speaking of odd mammals getting in the house, I remember a possum got in once and hid under the china cupboard. My brother and I got it out with a broom and a towel. Oh, and one summer Mom had a skunk move in to the crawlspace under her house. She borrowed a have-a-hart trap from the neighbors and trapped it, and guess who was volunteered to haul the trap out and open it? I still don't know how I managed to avoid being sprayed.

[seaslug_of_doom]

I'm going to have to remember to get dressed before I go in the bathroom.
And it is necessary not to be naked around small birds because...?

[barbarakelley]

one copes better with most any sort of stress in clothes... I find that to be the case, anyway...

[seaslug_of_doom]

You haven't seen my wardrobe.

[saanen]

They might ATTACK!