Home Invasion by Masked Aliens

"Music hath charms to soothe the savage beast." Especially if it's played from a Bulgarian gaida (bagpipe).

With the human infringement of wildlife habitats, wildlife sightings and infestations of homes have been increasingly more common. I live in a medium sized city, on the outskirts, and have seen a deer and a fawn in a neighbor's driveway during daylight hours, a coyote in a parking lot, and opossums mating in my driveway.

Two summers ago, a friend of mine had a family of raccoons nesting in her chimney. This did not sit well with her mom, who wanted these intruders out RIGHT AWAY.

My friend tried to evict them with the most obnoxious, as she put it, music she could find, which was music from the Rhodope region of Bulgaria, where they tend to get a little crazy with the bagpipes.

Here's one of the pieces she used, from a CD called "Beyond the Mystery", a collection of village music from Bulgaria:



In my previous post on bagpipes, http://katleyplanetbg.blogspot.com/2010/06/bagpipe-and-bulgarian-folk-music.html
I mentioned that people fall into two camps when it comes to this instrument: they either love it or hate it. There is no middle ground, and some people consider the bagpipe an instrument of torture which should be banned by the Geneva Convention.

Critters, on the other hand, seem to like it. What's ironic is that bagpipes are made from the hides of goats and sheep. Why animals like music created from the remains of other animals is a mystery to me.

My cat loves Bulgarian folk music and according to my daughter, seemed a little depressed the weekend my husband and I were away. She mentioned that he wasn't eating much. I told her Fatso needed his daily dose of Radio Bulgaria's folklore broadcasts. As soon as we got home and turned on the bagpipes, Fatso was his happy self again, attacking his food with gusto.

Here's the story of the attempted wildlife eviction and the measures a friend took to rid her home of masked aliens. It's really quite funny :)

http://www.helium.com/items/1491649-raccoon-eviction


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