That blighter has gotten on my last nerve.

He’s eaten two baby fishes from the lotus pond. He’s ripped up a 30.00 lily. And the struggling lotus. He’s ripped up some of the waterlily pads on the main pond and tossed bark chips into the pond that nearly stalled out the 300.00 master pump, and would have if I hadn’t seen the waterfall stall out and gotten down on my hands and knees to decouple the pump and clear it of bark chips. He’s tried to eat our larger koi. He’s set off alarms that got us locked out in the back yard and cost us a 300.00 basement window.

Tolerance has run out. My only way to deter him forbids our cats the pleasure of their own garden. He’s destroying stuff. He’s eating our fishes. And waking us up at night. So he’s toast. I’ve called someone who will trap him in a trap safe for neighborhood cats, so if I get the neighbor kitty by mistake, we can just turn him loose. But this is war. Unfortunately by state law there’s no catch and release for this fellow, and I’m very sorry about that, but he’s beyond the annual nuisance some of his kin are who just trek through on their way to the river. He’s regarding our back yard as his and is big enough to threaten neighborhood pets, and I’m drawing the line.