It's Official

[Cmar]

We don't have Coyotes but we do have Dingoes. They are all over the Australian mainland but the ones on Fraser Island attract the most attention as it is such a popular tourist and camping spot.
(I have camped there many times and never had a problem - basically just do what you would do for bears, don't keep food in your tent, or leave it lying around, put all scraps in the bins provided, or lock them up securely and DON'T TRY TO FEED THEM) You might note that some are wearing tags or ID collars, they are ones implicated in incidents in the past.
They are trying to protect these dingoes as they are one of the last bastions of purebred dingoes due to the islands isolation. Mainland ones except for the remote desert, have varying amounts of domestic dog DNA from interbreeding.
I must admit this one shows some class! French tourist no less.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-07...ngo-attacks-spike-what-is-behind-it/102629828

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[moorejl57]

Your absolutely right about javelinas being more dangerous (we have them here is our state too) but also a rabid pack of coyotes can create a serious threat...

I now worry they will stalk Ranger owners waiting for our transmissions to fail.

 

[DukeCanBuildit]

The coyotes we would see back in AZ were mostly smaller ones running around the city lost and you'd mistake them for a small dog until you got closer. The larger ones are out in the desert and are usually smarter and don't wonder far from there. The two here I saw walking down the street in front of the house were the size of the one Paul posted above. They were definitely more afraid of me and once they saw me they bolted into the woods before I could even get a picture. When we walk and hike I always carry because you just never know if/when you'll come across something feral/rabid like that poor guy in the video.

We have coyotes right in the heart of Toronto wherever there’s a ravine. They are active in the neighbourhood at dusk and dawn but usually bolt when people yell or appear threatening. They’re after easy pickings from garbage and compost bins. If we could teach them to develop a taste for raccoons, we could solve two problems at once.

 

[AzScorpion]

We don't have Coyotes but we do have Dingoes. They are all over the Australian mainland but the ones on Fraser Island attract the most attention as it is such a popular tourist and camping spot.
(I have camped there many times and never had a problem - basically just do what you would do for bears, don't keep food in your tent, or leave it lying around, put all scraps in the bins provided, or lock them up securely and DON'T TRY TO FEED THEM) You might note that some are wearing tags or ID collars, they are ones implicated in incidents in the past.
They are trying to protect these dingoes as they are one of the last bastions of purebred dingoes due to the islands isolation. Mainland ones except for the remote desert, have varying amounts of domestic dog DNA from interbreeding.
I must admit this one shows some class! French tourist no less.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-07...ngo-attacks-spike-what-is-behind-it/102629828

That reminds me of this Seinfeld episode. ??

 

[Cmar]

That reminds me of this Seinfeld episode. ??

That was quite a sad story, that eventually - after several court cases and appeals was upheld. I feel sorry that in the meantime their marriage broke down, and the husband died a broken man. The woman was imprisoned on incomplete forensic evidence, and false assumptions.
If they had just asked the local indigenous population dingoes stealing babies and young children was well documented in their culture.

 

[OrangeStreak]

We don't have Coyotes but we do have Dingoes. They are all over the Australian mainland but the ones on Fraser Island attract the most attention as it is such a popular tourist and camping spot.
(I have camped there many times and never had a problem - basically just do what you would do for bears, don't keep food in your tent, or leave it lying around, put all scraps in the bins provided, or lock them up securely and DON'T TRY TO FEED THEM) You might note that some are wearing tags or ID collars, they are ones implicated in incidents in the past.
They are trying to protect these dingoes as they are one of the last bastions of purebred dingoes due to the islands isolation. Mainland ones except for the remote desert, have varying amounts of domestic dog DNA from interbreeding.
I must admit this one shows some class! French tourist no less.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-07...ngo-attacks-spike-what-is-behind-it/102629828

The problem is that some people don't realize that if they get too close and comfortable with a non-domestic animal it can trigger a threat for it and the instinct is to attack for self-preservation.

While in the trail area near where I live, I talked with a man who was hiking with a large dog that looked very capable of defending itself. He said that on a hike, suddenly a coyote about 3/4 the size of his dog came from behind and nipped his dog's tail then left quickly. Evidently the coyote sensed alarm that led to a threat and it reacted by giving a warning signal.

And on the other hand, an animal who is rabid is almost impossible to deal with...they can lose their sense of instinct, control and it can suspend their natural inclination to fear.

https://www.in.gov/health/eph/files/Rabies_QF.pdf

 

[Doc]

We have a lot here, they rarely show their self in the daytime, but at night once a month or so there are packs of them in the woods, howling and yipping..

 

[deleriumtremor]

I just sold my house here in AZ today!


Most here know I’ve been talking about moving and we’ve made several trip out NW Arkansas over the last 2 years. After our last trip late September of '23 and not finding a house I liked (my OCD gets me every time ) I decided to switch gears and look for a lot. Long story short I found one right across the street from the largest lakes in the area and closed on it in November. I had an architect draft us a house from 2 different prints and a whole bunch of ideas I had from working in thousands of homes over the years. Then had to research and talk with several builders until I narrowed it down to two. I flew out there right before Easter to meet with them and really liked the first one so much I cancelled the second appointment. Sometimes you just get that gut feeling (no it wasn't gas ) about someone and being in the trades for 42 years I'm pretty confident I did. This will (hopefully) be our retirement dream home full of custom stuff like stepped up ceilings, custom built cabinets, upgraded windows and HVAC, a real floor to ceiling stone fireplace and spray foam insulation throughout. I'm hoping to do a metal roof but still waiting for that price to come back and not sure it's going to be in the budget.

We were going to start building late summer and I was going to put the house for sale here just after the new year. The more I thought about it with interest rates all over the place and the election coming up I decided to do it now. Annie was heading back to Chicago for her yearly mandatory meeting in mid March so I worked day/night for 3 weeks cleaning, decluttering and selling stuff and listed it on April 4th. Three days later I got a full price offer and we just closed on it today!

Now the real fun begin! The ABF freight truck comes on the 17th, loading it on the 18th and we’re out of here on the 20th. Luckily I sold almost all our stuff so it wont be to bad. Well, except for all the stuff Annie’s bought throughout our travels. ?‍ We've been living like refugees with everything all boxed up, bubble wrapped and scattered everywhere for weeks now. lol I found a 3/2 house 3.5 miles from where we’re building so we’ll be renting that until it’s build which will most likely be next spring.

We'll be driving the tremor out there which is about 1,200 miles and staying over in Tucumcari, New Mexico (on Rt 66) which is the half way point. I know Paul @OrangeStreak lives in NM but not sure how far from here you are and is this a decent area? I'm not sure how much time we'll have or if there's anything in/around the area to do but any info would be helpful.

Hi Dave, sorry I didn't see this thread until now.

Congratulations on the sale and the new adventure. Building is usually a trial, but in the end you get what you want and that is really a big payback.

The area you have chosen is beautiful. My wife had a family reunion at a resort in that area a long time ago. It was very near Eureka Springs. What a great area for outdoor recreation.

Best of luck on the build and the next phase of your life.

 

[AzScorpion]

Hi Dave, sorry I didn't see this thread until now.

Congratulations on the sale and the new adventure. Building is usually a trial, but in the end you get what you want and that is really a big payback.

The area you have chosen is beautiful. My wife had a family reunion at a resort in that area a long time ago. It was very near Eureka Springs. What a great area for outdoor recreation.

Best of luck on the build and the next phase of your life.

Thanks Bill and glad to see you're still around! I've done a lot of research and always kept coming back to this area and so far we really like it. We haven't had much time to really see the whole area yet and will as time goes by.

I built both my houses back east so this one will be a little different not having total control. lol The builder is really great though and seeing as it's a custom and not a spec we can do/change pretty much anything along the way. I really wanted to do a metal roof and was sticker shocked (so was the builder) when he got the price. It was $24,750 and a 40 year Tamko architectural is $9,200 so it looks like asphalt it is. lol

Hope all is well with you and Mary and she's keeping you in line. ?

 

[deleriumtremor]

Thanks Bill and glad to see you're still around! I've done a lot of research and always kept coming back to this area and so far we really like it. We haven't had much time to really see the whole area yet and will as time goes by.

I built both my houses back east so this one will be a little different not having total control. lol The builder is really great though and seeing as it's a custom and not a spec we can do/change pretty much anything along the way. I really wanted to do a metal roof and was sticker shocked (so was the builder) when he got the price. It was $24,750 and a 40 year Tamko architectural is $9,200 so it looks like asphalt it is. lol

Hope all is well with you and Mary and she's keeping you in line. ?

We have standing seam metal on the shed portions of our porches front and back. I love a lot about them, but there are downsides as well, mostly that they are pretty fragile when someone has to get up there. The standing seams can get bent over pretty easily, etc.

I hope you have avoided the nutty pricing on building materials that happened a while back. We had finished our house and I was talking to the builder who was putting a foundation in not far from where we live. He said lumber had quadrupled between the time he bid the project and they started to dig the footings for the foundation. The customer put a hold on the project for a number of months while they assessed the staying power of the price increases. As it is, I think between the Fed and Bidenomics, prices are only going one way for the rest of our lives.

 

[AzScorpion]

We have standing seam metal on the shed portions of our porches front and back. I love a lot about them, but there are downsides as well, mostly that they are pretty fragile when someone has to get up there. The standing seams can get bent over pretty easily, etc.

I hope you have avoided the nutty pricing on building materials that happened a while back. We had finished our house and I was talking to the builder who was putting a foundation in not far from where we live. He said lumber had quadrupled between the time he bid the project and they started to dig the footings for the foundation. The customer put a hold on the project for a number of months while they assessed the staying power of the price increases. As it is, I think between the Fed and Bidenomics, prices are only going one way for the rest of our lives.

Prices are crazy on just about everything now but one good thing is he's doing this for a flat fee. Most builders here doing custom build are getting cost plus 15% on every item. This will save a a lot with all those little add ons throughout the build and trust me I already have a list of them. We me with him last Friday and asked how much things have gone up since he quoted the project and he said it's been pretty stable here lately. I'm figuring to have around $20K in extras from the original quote which was money I had put aside for the AZ house if we had stayed there. The metal roof would've blow that budget! He just complete 3 spec houses and all come in within his budget with no beverages from material increases. One was a house he's built before so it was a good comparison.

I just thought having the metal roof would've saved us from doing another in our lifetime as they're usually good for 50+ year. Plus I like the look but not at almost 3x's the cost and especially at our age. Maybe if we were 20-30 years younger the ROI would've made more sense but at 60 it doesn't. You'll usually get around 20 years +/- out of a 40 year roof so if we're still around in our 80's (both alive and in the area lol) I'll replace it then.

 

[deleriumtremor]

Prices are crazy on just about everything now but one good thing is he's doing this for a flat fee. Most builders here doing custom build are getting cost plus 15% on every item. This will save a a lot with all those little add ons throughout the build and trust me I already have a list of them. We me with him last Friday and asked how much things have gone up since he quoted the project and he said it's been pretty stable here lately. I'm figuring to have around $20K in extras from the original quote which was money I had put aside for the AZ house if we had stayed there. The metal roof would've blow that budget! He just complete 3 spec houses and all come in within his budget with no beverages from material increases. One was a house he's built before so it was a good comparison.

I just thought having the metal roof would've saved us from doing another in our lifetime as they're usually good for 50+ year. Plus I like the look but not at almost 3x's the cost and especially at our age. Maybe if we were 20-30 years younger the ROI would've made more sense but at 60 it doesn't. You'll usually get around 20 years +/- out of a 40 year roof so if we're still around in our 80's (both alive and in the area lol) I'll replace it then.

The good news is with your experience in the trades, surprises should be pretty far and few between. Also, when the surprises do crop up, the solution is likely to be a little more equitable than if you were a "deer in the headlights" newbie.

 

[DukeCanBuildit]

So, you’ve been there a few times already and now that you’ve had a bit more of a “full-time” experience, how has that been? Are you discovering more about the area or are you just too busy with boxes still? Most importantly, how’s Annie settling in?

 

[Chris M]

So, you’ve been there a few times already and now that you’ve had a bit more of a “full-time” experience, how has that been? Are you discovering more about the area or are you just too busy with boxes still? Most importantly, how’s Annie settling in?

You've nailed it, brother. We all know "if Mama ain't happy, nobody's happy!"

 

[OrangeStreak]

So, you’ve been there a few times already and now that you’ve had a bit more of a “full-time” experience, how has that been? Are you discovering more about the area or are you just too busy with boxes still? Most importantly, how’s Annie settling in?

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