Escapees March-April 2023

Finding a mouse in your RV is no fun. Even worse is mice destroying your truck engine’s wiring harness! W e’ve always eliminated mice in our rig easily with baited traps. However, mice and pack-rats are a huge problem in our neighborhood, and despite using the most popular deterrents, our truck engine’s main wiring harness was chewed through twice in one month. Fortunately, my husband, Mark, was able to solder and shrink-wrap the severed wires despite their awkward location under the fuse box. Both of us were frustrated beyond belief. In a fi t of pique, Mark bought some Tomcat rat poison and put it under the truck. We knew nothing about rat poison. We just wanted the rodents gone ! The next day I saw a green object like a dog treat on our dog’s mat in the back yard. It was a brick of rat poison and about a quarter of it had been eaten! Panic stricken, Mark scoured the yard and found only seven of the eight poison bricks that came in the box. I called Tomcat’s poison hotline, and they told me a brick and a quarter was a lethal dose for a 25 lb. dog, the size of our beloved pup, Buddy. My world keeled over and crashed as I heard these words. Sweet little Buddy was happily prancing around the yard, oblivious. I called his veterinarian and was told to spray hydrogen peroxide in his mouth to induce vomiting and get to the emergency animal hospital, an hour away, immediately. After coughing up pale green phlegm (proving he had eaten at least some of the poison), we drove like wild fi re to the hospital. Buddy was bright eyed and bushy-tailed and looked at us pleadingly as the vet techs took him away. The veterinarian, Dr. Frost, explained that Tomcat’s poison chemical, bromethalin, causes brain swelling and seizures and has no antidote. There is zero chance of survival once a dog has a seizure.

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ESCAPEES Magazine March/April 2023