James Piper, Author

Wednesday, September 5, 2012 ... if it's not the cat then what is it ... L ast night I was out back, sitting in the hot tub. It was dark. Cloudy skies. Not much light except for the one in the tub. I'm relaxing and thinking. The noise of the whirling water drowning out most sounds. I'm in a zone when I look up to see the faint image of an animal’s face approaching the edge of the hot tub—its nose almost touching the wooden deck. It moved closer as if wanting to sniff the water. In the darkness, I thought it was our cat and I wondered how it got out of the house, but as it moved closer, looking as if it might jump into the water, might jump at me, I realized the face was far too large, too wide—the body too big. It wasn’t our cat, it was a racoon. At least I thought it was a racoon. Not wanting to learn more, I swung my arm through the water. A wave rose up and drenched the deck. When the water settled I looked around and couldn’t find the creature. Maybe my ...

Saturday, March 10, 2007 ... mourning doves take over the nest ... I n the late summer of 2006, a pair of robins decided to build a nest on a spout that ran down from the eavestrough then back under the roof. Where it attached to the side of the house, the spout is almost horizontal giving the birds a flat surface to build their nest and a protected area from rain, wind and I suppose predators. They worked non-stop to build this nest. An engineering marvel—sturdy—built of twigs, grass, string and mud. Then came their chicks. Two parents and two chicks. The parents took turns gathering worms to feed the chicks. Flight after the flight, one parent would arrive with food then the other would leave to find more. Hour after hour these chicks were feed. At first, the points of their beaks were the only thing that popped out of the nest, later, more of the beaks, then more, then their necks showed, until, not less than four weeks later these chicks were as big as th...

Monday, March 5, 2007 ... a valuable lesson about rabies ... T here is a story in the news that a man is in an Albertan hospital waiting to die. There are probably hundreds of people in hospitals waiting to die and it's not news, but for this man, they won't disclose his name, it is news because he is dying of rabies. As a child growing up in rural Ontario, people talked about rabies. I remember one instance where a dog at a cousin's farm was quarantined to determine if he had rabies and I was in no circumstance to go near the abandoned chick coup where he was held and I didn't. I also remember horror stories about people who got rabies. They had to spend weeks in hospital getting injections forty times a day with needles as long as my leg and as thick as pretzels. The treatment seemed horrifying but never once did anyone explain that a bite from a rabid animal (e.g., a bat, fox, skunk) would lead to certain death without medical treatment. Now, ye...