incorporate them into the soil ...

dig out perennial ... set aside ... insert carcass .. put plant back on top .. lol

they arent zombies.. depth isnt really an issue.. no grave robbers.. etc ... basically... deep enough to cut the smell ...

ken

I found a dead bird once and didn't want to touch it, even with a shovel so I just dumped about a foot of mulch on it. Disappeared very quickly and I never smelled anything.

LOL, Kevin, you do come up with the most interesting threads!

I have the luxury of having a patch of woods behind my house, so I just toss anything out there.

I went down to the basement just last week to paint some trim, and also smelled that lovely smell. I tracked it to a bucket that had been down there for years, but which a plumber doing some work must have used two days before, as it was now full of water. I didn't look too closely but asked my husband to do the dirty work of dumping the bucket in the woods. At first he said that wasn't the cause of the smell but then as he looked in the bucket said "wups! Yes it is!" Yuck. Not just dead, dead and waterlogged and bloated. Barf. Don't know what the heck I'd do without those woods!

Dee

"disappeared into the poufosphere" - love that! I know crows can be good for disposal, but my flock seems to have vanished.

Dee - what was in the bucket? Curious minds want to know.

Ken- your comment about zombies reminded me of my favorite cartoon of all time.

Here is a link that might be useful: Chipmunks

I usually bury it. Although I did bag and toss the mouse I found because I didn't feel like digging the little b-word that was eating my plants a grave surrounded by the plants it was killing (I wasn't the cause of it's demise, maybe it finally ate the wrong plant). Birds, bunnies...those all get buried in the flower beds.

Oh, sorry, yes, in the bucket - the usual, mice. We get them here, and every so often find a dead one (or two)inside, thankfully usually in the basement, not the house itself. If something is outside, I let mother nature take care of it, as long as it's not like right on the patio or front steps, lol.

Once we did have a rather elaborate funeral for a robin. We came home and found the poor thing half alive on the back steps. Must have flown into the door or something. Unfortunately for me, my then-five or six-year-old son was with me, so we had to try to nurse it, and I was actually on the phone for an hour with various places trying to find help for it. Sigh, the things mothers do for their children.

The poor thing did't last much longer than an hour or so, so we decorated a shoe box for its coffin, went out back, dug a whole, said a few words, my son cried, and that was that.

Now, they get tossed in the woods, lol.

Dee

Recently we had a power outage in the middle of the night; a hydro employee with the help of my husband found a huge raccoon at the base of the hydro transformer pole on our acreage. Seems that a neighbour's dog had chased the poor critter up the pole and he was instantly electocuted resulting in the power outage. Needless to say Mr. Raccoon got quite odoriforous in a short period of time; despite reminders, hubby was slow to take care of the "body". I came home several days later and noted our "friend" was gone and assumed he had been taken care of. Well, he had been taken care of, just not by whom I expected. On further inspection a trail of fur disappeared into the trees. Just goes to show you, procrastinate and someone or thing will do the job for you! Poor creature!

I would disagree Ken, there are many critters who prowl the night who would dig something up if it smelled just right to them. I have the woods like diggerdee. If I toss it it is out of my way and usually something else comes along and as said poof it is gone rather swiftly. Having said that my dog used to LOVE finding dead things in the woods to roll in. A day of my gardening and her exploring often resulted in baths for both of us!! She was my gardening companion for years. She died a week ago. We buried her a good four feet deep.

I've seen dead animals nearby but never actually in my beds, thank goodness!

A few years ago I watched as a hawk took a young rabbit and flew to the far corner of my neighbor's yard to eat dinner in peace.

Another time I was doing the final bit of my spring clean-up. It was early evening so it was a little difficult to see. I cleared away a big bunch of leaves. Then I cleared away some other stuff. Then I reached in .... I don't know who was more suprised, me or mama rabbit when I tried to grab her. The babies were almost full grown, so a few days later they left the den.

I try to bury when practical, but at certain times of the year it's not.

I keep a bag of powdered lime around in the garden shed. If any dearly departed needs to be bagged up and kept for garbage day, sealing it up tightly in a garbage bag with somewhere between 1 cup (chipmunk sized) to 4 cups (raccoon, opossum) of lime, and then double or even triple bagging THAT bag, keeps odor away and makes it not so unpleasant, even in very hot weather.

"...Just goes to show you, procrastinate and someone or thing will do the job for you! ..."

Hmm, why doesn't that work with housework? Sigh...

Dee

No one has suggested the "store it in the freezer until garbage day" solution!
Jan

Most of the dead animals I find are out on the street. Just a simple bag them and place them into the trash container. Hopefully they are now in some vast beautiful valley with a shallw softly running stream and have lots of room to play and grow and enjoy being alive without fear anymore.

Dead things found on our acre are placed on top of our on going brush pile at a far corner. Our resident crows quickly take care of it.

Update:

I didn't feel like looking for the dead thing yesterday, so I didn't. Big mistake! When I went to bed last night, I opened my bedroom window because it was cooling off outside. I climbed into bed and at first I was pleased to smell the fragrance of an orchid I have outside, right next to my bedroom window. It's a Brassavola nodosa which is only fragrant at night and is absolutely heavenly!

However, very soon I started to smell that dead thing. I didn't want to close the windows, but I just couldn't take that smell. I finally ended up sleeping with a towel over my nose.

The next morning, my whole house stunk like dead stuff. Around 5:30 am, I went outside and started looking around. Finally found the critter - a dead squirrel. The weird thing was I think he got electrocuted. His little paws were touching the wire surrounding my pond. Because of racoons, I put in a fido-shock many years ago. It's the only thing that will keep them out of my pond. The weird thing is I didn't think the jolt was strong enough to kill anything. I've touched it a few times and it does give a jolt, but nothing really terrible. Maybe the squirrel had heart problems??

No one has suggested the "store it in the freezer until garbage day" solution!

the problem, having done this with voles that my cat killed, is that I keep forgetting to put them in the garbage. They eventually became a point of reference: "in front of the ice cream, to the left of the mice".

Now I toss them in the green bin (the city's organic recycling).

"No one has suggested the "store it in the freezer until garbage day" solution!"

I did this recently. My DH had to go on a trip last month and I was missing him and having a bit of a cry session, when one of our cats brought in a dying baby rabbit. It was tore up pretty bad but still struggling. That pushed me over the edge...I started to sob and I took it outside and laid it on the grass and stroked it's head until it died, sobbing the whole time. Normally I would take a "gift" vole or mouse and toss it over to the vacant lot next door, but I was in such a state that I couldn't do it with the bunny. I took it back inside, wrapped it in a plastic bag and put it in the freezer until garbage day. The whole thing was a bit embarrassing because my neighbor was watching me.

I'm very sorry for the loss of your gardening companion dog, arcy. RIP

Small deceased critters usually end up in the weeds next to my pet memorial garden, or sometimes in a clump of phlox or daylilies or iris. I usually utter a short eulogy along the lines of "rest peacefully little one and make the flowers grow."

Wow, in 13 years of living in this house I've only had to deal with a dead critter once - a squirrel who get tangled in the sump pump exit hole. DH took care of that. Oh, and a frog on the stepping stones, which I just pushed aside into the mulch.

I figure the critters higher up the food chain are taking care of the disposal - that is nature's way, after all. I often see the crows overhead circling and calling and assume it's dinner time...

I saw a turkey vulture near where I work last summer. Never saw one before, didn't realize how huge those darn birds are! Also saw a big 'ol owl enjoying his dinner at dusk. So, yea, nature takes care of all that. Outside, at least - fortunately haven't found anything dead yet (yet...) in the house

"No one has suggested the "store it in the freezer until garbage day" solution!"

And then it can become a hearty stew come Autumn. . .

Carl :>)

'dust to dust'....they are placed in the middle of one of our compost bins.

The solution to dead critter disposal is easy. Just toss the body into your neighbor's yard, preferably at night.

We actually have an area of woods that borders the property on three sides, and I've had to do the corpse shovel-toss* over the deer fence into the trees.

*I was willing to represent the U.S. in this event, but the Olympic committee never called me.size>

LOL Eric!

I found this thread rather humorous.

Gift rats and mice are put in the trash. I stopped DH from doing the neighbor fence toss...

*I was willing to represent the U.S. in this event, but the Olympic committee never called me.

Yep, I was a contender for the 18inch dash.

The "corpse shovel-toss"!! TOO funny!
We have groundhogs that expire due to "lead poisoning" & my husband gives them a "shovel ride" up the hill to a patch of loose sand that should have rows of headstones!
The occasional former aquarium resident goes under the rose bushes, and we have lovely roses!

For several years I house-sat in the country for the 1st 2 weeks of July each year. One year the resident dog (Blackie-I swear he lived to come up with mischief!) brought home a groundhog friend, only Mr. G had met with mayhem some time ago & resembled a furry basketball in appearance, and something VERY nasty in scent! Of course this was shortly before I was expecting guests for a picnic, so I grabbed the shovel & heaved Mr. G into the treerow. Blackie responded by bounding into the treerow & returning the foul carcass to me, all the while smiling (I swear!) and exclaiming What Fun!
What now? I grabbed a large garbage bag & attempted to roll Mr G into it with the shovel while Blackie enjoyed trying to keep the carcass OUT of the bag! Finally I won the battle & the dog won a "time out" in his fenced area.
Now I start to toss the bag in the back of my car until the smell hits me again & I say "In my CAR!? NO way!" Now what?
In the end, I hold the bag out the open drivers window & drive slowly down the dirt road beyond the property where I pitched it down a ravine about a mile away!
The dog had some fun, & Mr. G did not return!

Jessew, that cracked me up! Thanks!