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<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\nMosquitoes are just a bane and I\u2019d do away with them altogether, so they can just all get shot into the sun for all I care. Screw mosquitoes. According to one source, Mosquito biomass has been calculated at 96 million pounds in Alaska alone<\/a>. So, yeah, they\u2019re doing fine and will outlast me and mine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I like bees and will generally leave them alone. Yellowjackets are the exception. Those guys are assholes. My wife Christina is not a fan of bees. I think she would open carry if it meant she could shoot bees. Bees are to her as spiders are to me. Unwelcome. But, I like them, generally.<\/p>\n\n\n\n As we go up in size and complexity, now we get into rodents and that sort.\u00a0 Yeah, I\u2019m going to kill them.\u00a0 Mice, voles, rats, all those little critters.\u00a0 They are unwelcome in my world.\u00a0 When we moved to our new place, the prior residents had a pest problem which they sold us along with the house.\u00a0 I could hear mice in the ceiling between our bedroom and the spare room upstairs.\u00a0 They ran laps between the joists at 4am.\u00a0 Long before we came along, they colonized under a cabinet.\u00a0 We know this because we moved the cabinet and found a plethora of birdseed and dog food they had squirreled away along with one corpse of a mouse.\u00a0 We found more seed and dog food behind the plates in the outlets, so that was not cool.\u00a0 We eventually brought in a pest control company to help us resolve the issue and over the course of months, it seems we have evicted most of the rodents.\u00a0 Their deaths do not weigh on my conscience.<\/p>\n\n\n\n My dad was a hunter when I was growing up. I couldn\u2019t wait to grow up enough go with him. I took the gun safety course, we went and did target practice and eventually, he gave me a small over\/under shotgun that had a .22 caliber on the top and a .410 shotgun on the bottom. It broke apart and could be stored in a case for travel. I loved that gun.<\/p>\n\n\n\n One weekend we were out hunting grouse, I think, when my dad spotted a rabbit down the road we were walking. He always spotted the critters before I did. He could see deer in the trees and would always see birds and critters. It seemed like a superpower. He told me to shoot the rabbit, so I lined up the shot and pulled the trigger and I hit it! But, I didn\u2019t kill it outright, I only wounded it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Here is something they don\u2019t tell you growing up: A wounded rabbit makes a terrible shriek!\u00a0 It was hurt and scared and wounded and I had done that damage.\u00a0 My dad told me I needed to kill it to put it out of its pain.\u00a0 I couldn\u2019t do it.\u00a0 He had to do it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n That was the last time I shot at an animal with a gun. I was 14. I wasn\u2019t going to be the cause of that pain to any creature again. I did go hunting a few times after that, but whenever the rare opportunity came to shoot at an animal, I shot high or to the side and \u201cmissed\u201d. I\u2019m sure my dad was disappointed, both at the rabbit situation and how poorly his son was at shooting. Not long after that, I retired from hunting altogether.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I recall a conversation with a guy I worked with who was a vegetarian and he asserted that anyone who was willing to eat meat should not only be able but willing to shoot that animal. I did not share his philosophy, but I can kind of understand it. However, that did not stop me from eating innumerable cows, pigs, chickens and fish that I had no role in killing. I was complicit, but not responsible. And I was fine with that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Back to the title of this one: What Value a Life? <\/p>\n\n\n\n I have crossed paths with a possum a couple of times walking from the house to the shop. It\u2019s not hurting anyone. It\u2019s not apparently aggressive. Actually, it\u2019s pretty skinny and ragged looking and it wants to be where I\u2019m not. Now I\u2019ve caught it a couple of times on our security cameras walking by our back door doing whatever it is that a possum does at 4:30 am in the morning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019d prefer he simply relocates himself.\u00a0 We have no food for him.\u00a0 We don\u2019t have dogs right now and when we do, the food is secured and inaccessible.\u00a0 Here is what the Humane Society says about opossum: \u201cOpossums get a bum rap. Often seen as a pest and accused of everything from knocking over garbage cans to killing chickens, these quiet marsupials are rarely a threat and easily sent on their way.<\/a>\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Sure, they may hiss at you, but it\u2019s a defensive bluff. I have not felt in any way threatened by this possum. She doesn\u2019t live under the house, so that\u2019s not an issue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I suppose if I got really bothered, I could buy a live animal trap for $75, catch the critter and relocate it somewhere away from here. I don\u2019t think I would kill it. I\u2019m not going to shoot it or starve it or somehow try and drown it. Those all sound terrible and I would feel bad. It would have to be relocation, I think.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Where does this leave me with the original question, though? It seems that it\u2019s partially a function of size and complexity. And surprise. Surprise is not good. Insects don\u2019t trigger any regret. Small critters and pests can die and it won\u2019t bother me. If we get much bigger than that and it does seem to trigger some kind of reaction that makes it less palatable, less appealing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n