I have a mole?!?

This happened over a week ago, but I had to post it for everyone to read...

So, it was a Tuesday morning. Pepper whined to go out around 7AM, and I got up to take him out. He came back inside and sniffed a bit at the floorboards right by the back door, but I thought nothing of it and got him back to bed for an hour or so.

When Matt and I got up, both dogs got busy sniffing the floorboards around the door, and elsewhere in the living room (the room right off the back porch). Pepper then became focused on the small space between to tall bookshelves. He barked, he dug, he even knocked stuff off the shelves. We looked as best we could and could not see a THING between the shelves, or behind the shelves.

An hour or two later, Pepper relocated. He stood, barking and digging, in front of the door to the closet where our stackable washer and dryer is. He was FOCUSED. I tried to re-direct his attention to his favorite toy. I figured when someone came over (at 11AM), he would at least run to the door and greet her, and bring her his toy. He did not.

The visitor (Nealy) and I looked at the washer/dryer to figure out if there was some way to look behind it. At this point, I knew there had to be SOMETHING back in the closet, but I didn't hear anything (I figured it was a mouse...). When the washer/dryer was installed, they had to take the door frame off, so we couldn't even move it forward to look behind it...

So, Nealy and I chatted on the couch, wondering if at some point we would see/hear this mouse...

Around 11:30 there was a scuffle where Pepper was (still) sitting. Boomer ran over, and Nealy screamed "I saw it! I saw it! It's a mouse!" I ran over in time to see the dogs running back from the rear hallway area, a little gray rodent amidst the chaos. I watched Boomer pick it up in his mouth and fling it. It hit the floor, and as Pepper went to take his turn, this thing LEPT up in the air. It screeched all the while - I thought...this is NOT a mouse! It sounds like a bat!


I finally got the dogs out the back door and the rodent scurried between a shelf and a box. I moved the box aside to see the little thing laying on it's side, pressed against the shelf. It was not a mouse, it was a MOLE!

I was amazed to see that it wasn't bloodied - though it was certainly playing dead! I trapped it under a bucket and managed to get it on a piece of cardboard. I figured if I got it out into the yard it would figure out where it was and where it was supposed to be. So, I got it out to the front porch and it fell off the cardboard....I tried to get it back on, and it sort of opened its mouth at me while it tried to figure out if getting back on the cardboard was a good idea.

Then, suddenly, it made a run for it! It was facing my feet...so it basically ran straight at me, and toward the house behind me! I got it back on the cardboard quickly and dumped it in the leaves in the garden. Last I saw it, it was lying on its back, playing dead. 20 minutes later it was gone.

How a mole found its way into our house I don't know. I *think* it probably came in when I let Pepper out that morning - because Pepper did not indicate anything was amiss when he went out, but definitely detected the little bugger when he came back in.

What have I learned from this? Pepper is always right. If Pepper says there's something there...he is to be trusted!