Chipmunks and Deterrence

My basement has four walls, two woodpiles, and—I discovered last week—a handsome chipmunk. A fine specimen, his facsimile would beautify any Christmas tree, but the real thing in my cellar? No. Determined to deport him, I set up a humane trap and let the dog downstairs now and then.

A word about my dog, whose name – an added deterrent –  is D’Artagnan: like the musketeer after whom he is named, he is an adventuresome sort, a fun-loving fellow – never happier than when digging for chipmunks in summer. He has never caught one, but he has endless fun trying.

On other days, responding to a primordial instinct, he goes down to the lake and waits. He always waits for ducks to paddle by, which they do. He always lunges and misses, their webbed feet easily outpacing his slow dog paddle. But he never loses hope and seems to love the whole process.

So, knowing D’Artagnan’s fondness for chipmunks, and not finding a duck in my cellar, I let him down there over the past two weeks. He goes down, prowls about, and comes back up. Meantime, I baited the humane cage trap.

At first, I imagined an easy catch, maybe multiple chipmunk intruders. I foresaw the need to begin a kind of fireman’s bucket brigade, with me at every station, setting, catching, carrying, and releasing outdoors – until I had cleared my basement of chipmunks.

Actually, I imagined worse, chipmunks proliferating in my warm basement, as Maine temperatures drop toward zero. I imagined having a kind of Mickey Mouse moment in Fantasia, bucket or cage followed by bucket or cage, instead of fighting rising waters, fighting a rising chipmunk flood.

This may seem unlikely, but temperatures in Maine go low fast and stay there for a while. My basement represents an island of delicious warmth in an ocean of frozen Chipmunk-land. So, I prepared for the worst but kept letting D’Artagnan do his rounds of the basement morning and evening.

Every day, sometimes twice a day, I would pop down and take a look at my well-baited cage, door up, trap set for the first hungry chipmunk to wander into my little saloon for a bite. But no luck.

To ensure I was on track to catch the intruder – and his illegal homesteading relatives – I rebaited the trap, and kept checking. Gradually, as D’Artagnan did his rounds, I accompanied him, watched to see where he sniffed, whether he was getting any chipmunk contact, any interceptions.

Interestingly, whether it was the cage itself, D’Artagnan’s thorough nature, his random prowl-abouts, or some combination, a remarkable thing has happened. Zit has truly happened.

Since that first day when I let D’Artagnan downstairs and gave him authority to arrest chipmunks on our premises, we have had no sightings, no chipmunk signs or noise. Wood, wires, and everything else are intact, unchewed. The basement appears, even with the trap still set, chipmunk-free.

So, why tell this true – mildly entertaining – story? Because some principles in life work for all parts of the animal kingdom chipmunks through people.

If you incentivize bad behavior, look the other way, imagine your intention alone will solve the problem, or that there is no problem, consequences multiply – sometimes adverse, getting worse.

But if you set out to deter that behavior, recognize it clearly, create reasons for it to change, reset the expectations, and put provisions in place that incentivize different behaviors, things change.

Will we be taking up the humane trap, stopping our periodic rounds, and assuming good behavior from the chipmunks, just because we got some? No. But are there some principles which – enforced at the borders of houses and nations – work, over and over? Yes. Deterring bad behavior is one.

As for D’Artagnan and Christmas, he thinks this new activity is interesting, but not as fun as digging for chipmunks all summer or waiting to surprise the ducks, for kicks. That said, his treat this Christmas week, don’t tell him, is duck sticks.