After spending thirty-nine years living in the country I have had my sleep interrupted many times by a variety of nature’s alarm clocks. The problem with that situation is the alarm clocks don’t always go off when its convenient for me or my sleep pattern.

Take this spring for example. It was 6:00 am, an hour and a half ahead of my normal wake up time when just outside our bedroom window the most awful “rat-a-tat-tat” filled the still morning air.

I sprang from my bed to see what was the matter! (I may have plagiarized that line from somewhere. It sounds familiar. 🙂 )

The early morning silence returned but only for a few minutes when the ear-splitting “rat-a-tat-tat” returned. A Hairy Woodpecker was trying to drill a hole in the metal eve trough next to our bedroom window.

I was in the mood to get my 22 rifle and drill a hole in Hairy! Instead I lay back down and tried to get back to sleep which Hairy made impossible as he periodically attacked our eve trough.

Google told me later in the morning that during the mating season of the Hairy Woodpecker the male uses that gosh-awful tapping to attract a mate. Once his “rat-a-tat-tat” is completed the bird listens for a return “rat-a-tat-tat” from an interested female.

Then they meet up share some grubs from some dying tree and see how compatible they are. If things work out they go in search of a hollow tree and begin a family.

An angry turkey roused me out of a deep slumber a couple summers ago when he saw his reflection in the windows of our house and tried to peck himself to death. Once again “I sprang from my bed to see what was the matter”.

I’m amazed his powerful beak didn’t shatter our window but I’m more amazed that I, still groggy from sleep, didn’t do something drastic that would have made it possible to enjoy a turkey dinner that evening! 🙂

Probably the quietist alarm clock went off about 3:00 am when I must have been in my shallow sleep cycle because I became aware of a slight breeze just above my head. It came and went several times as I was becoming semi conscious.

Again I sprang from my bed and turned on the light quickly to discover a bat gliding around our bedroom. I was instantly fully awake and focused on what I had to do.

Down the stairs I stumbled turning on lights as I went. Soon the house was aglow with light as I headed for our attached garage. Entering the garage my eyes searched for my weapon of choice…..my butterfly net salvaged from my biology teaching years. It was a retirement gift I gave to myself and thank goodness I did.

Returning to our bedroom I spent ten minutes or so swinging and slashing the air as the winged monster kept eluding my attempts to capture it. Finally it flew into my net and I removed it from the house.

Since it was now around 3:30 am I made a futile attempt to return to sleep. Adrenaline has the amazing ability to prevent that from happening. 🙂

Then there was that dang rooster pheasant. I had a pile of black dirt that I planned on spreading on our yard. The pile of dirt was directly below our bedroom window. Do you see where this going?

In the spring rooster pheasants establish a crowing area. While their half dozen wives are busy incubating eggs in nests hidden in the tall grasses near our house the rooster pheasant selects a site to announce to the world that he is the boss of the area.

I guess our pile of black dirt looked like a perfect spot for the rooster to do his announcing. His announcing consisted of a couple of piercing screeches followed by beating his wings against his body.

Needless to say when that first announcement from Mr. Rooster erupted from high on that dirt pile both my wife, Kathie, and I sprang from our beds! Did I mention the time was 6:00 am?

For the next hour the crowing rooster repeated the process every ten minutes or so. This continued for about a month. Can you say ‘sleep deprived’?

But I have saved my worst nature alarm clock experience for last. Again it was around 3:00 am when I heard a commotion in the garage. I crept out of bed, down the stairs to the garage door, turned the light on quickly and opened the door to the garage. That was a big mistake! My wife and daughter have still not forgiven me for that move.

When the skunk that was eating the cat food was momentarily blinded by the garage light and the sound of the door opening it did it’s natural thing. It released probably the most foul smelling gas in the world.

As the foul smell was released and the door to the garage opened the gas was sucked into our house. Our daughter’s prom dress was hanging in the living room and it took on the sweet smell of skunk as did the rest of the house.

The dress was sent to the dry cleaners as the prom was the following weekend. When the dress returned wrapped in a clear, plastic bag I opened the bag and smelled hoping against hope there would be no smell. I was wrong. Our daughter attended her junior prom with just a hint of skunk perfume.

The garage had to be emptied of everything and we tried tomato juice, coffee grounds, soap and water and several other sure fire removers of skunk smell. Each helped a little but the smell lingered for days afterwards.

What was the lesson we learned? As the sun goes down so does the garage door!

So those are just some of the nature alarm clock stories. There are more but one blog can’t handle them all.

Writing this blog has reminded me of the many lost hours of sleep I experienced as nature’s critters created havoc with my sleep habits. In fact, “yawn”, I’m feeling a little exhausted right now. I think I’m going to take a nap! 🙂

Until next time.