Pack Rat Woes

Last Friday I went out to start the truck and oops! the batteries were dead. So I got out my trusty battery charger and opened the hood. And...what did I find...a nicely built pack rat's nest stuck down in the engine compartment made with insulation material from the firewall, insulation from a wire and lined with cacti, ouch! I pulled the nest out, wraped the wire with black tape and charged the battery. Then I borrowed an animal trap from one of the rangers, baited it with a piece of shiny tin foil and caught this little fellow the next morning. We were going to Vernal, UT the next day so now he is a resident of Utah. I released him at a rest stop in Utah about 20 miles from here. Here is his picture.Pack Rat aka Bushytail Woodrat (Neotoma cinerea).