Dead Armadillo

this post may be disturbing

Double Negative Dispatch Issue #92

I took this picture of a dead armadillo weeks ago. This is a photo of the fresh corpse. I didn’t witness the death, but I know the killer. He’s a scary good marksman. He once shot a beaver that was probably about 100+ feet away on his pond briefly sticking its head above the water. One shot with a .22 rifle and it nailed it. Hours later, the dead beaver was floating in the water moving around. How was this possible? Could it have possibly have been wounded and was still alive, suffering on the surface of the pond?

The truth was more disturbing.

I couldn’t believe it. It was being slowly devoured by small turtles. As I walked closer to the pond, I could see their little heads bobbing in and out of the water, taking bites of the beaver bit by bit. I had never seen anything like it in my life. And after a few more hours, I wouldn’t be seeing the beaver again either.

Back to the armadillo. They are known pests. They also carry leprosy. But the problem with armadillos is that they dig a bunch of holes and trenches all around the property in search of grubs and stuff. This armadillo was in search of breakfast, but little did he know that he’d be meeting a swift end that day.

I took the picture because the light was good, and I had never seen an armadillo that close. I’m not a country mouse, so the idea that someone would wake up, still in their bathrobe and shoot a pest is a pretty wild one.

I’ve only shot two animals in my life, both while hunting. Years ago, I was invited on a squirrel hunt, and I dropped a squirrel out of a tree. It made an almost comical THUD as it hit the dirt. Unfortunately, I never found it. It got away. Wounded, I assume. I still feel bad about that. The second animal I shot was a dove. That one I definitely killed. It was a seasonal hunt I was invited to join. But a Great Pyrenees dog stole it and started feasting on it. I’ve never seen a happier dog with blood dripping out of its mouth, staining its pure white coat.

I’ve had my fill of shooting animals for one lifetime. But if I lived on a big piece of land in the middle of nowhere, and say, made the mistake of grilling delicious meats which attracted packs of coyotes to come threaten my dog, maybe I’d be okay with picking a few off. That said, I went for a jog once in a field and a huge coyote ran alongside me briefly for a few seconds. There was something majestic about it. (My dachshund probably wouldn’t think so though)

It occurs to me that posting this photo of an armadillo corpse is unsettling, as is my talk of using firearms to end the lives of small animals. But around here in South Carolina, such talk is pretty common. In fact, I made spaghetti and a wonderful meat sauce with some venison that a friend gave me from a recent hunt. So while I’m riddled with guilt over a squirrel that I wounded, I’d rather my friend shoot a deer than a deer being crammed into a small cage at birth with a bunch of other weakened deer to be ground up in a factory farm.

As far as pest killing, as far as I see it, that beaver floating in a pond was a grand feast for the little turtles nipping at the bloated dead rodent. And I assume the armadillo was eventually carried off by some other creature making for a sort of vermin oysters casino.

I think the photo is pretty good though. The light was primo. So even if the armadillo just slowly rotted away as zero use to any other animal, at least I got a chance to feast on its corpse.

Oh btw, here’s a video about reading: