Aug

14

Is it, "Life offers so many parallels to trading," or "Trading offers so many parallels to life?" I'm not sure which is more correct, but our little family experienced an event this past week from which I could easily draw trading parallels.

We have a seven pound yorkipoo dog that's one year old and the pride and joy of both my wife and 8 year old daughter. Of course, my brothers and I (who live on the same street), being the machismos that we are, usually refer to her as a "rat dog", or "little yapper" just to do a little teasing toward that "wimpy" dog.

We live on a little over one acre out in a more rural setting. One early morning, around 1:30 AM, I took our little yorkipoo out in our backyard to do her business. I usually stay out there with her but I had a "pressing matter" to take care of myself. So, as she scampered toward the darkness of our backyard, I slipped in the house where there was a bathroom right by the back door.

Just as I was stepping out of the bathroom and putting my hand on the door knob to go back outside I heard this extremely loud and piercing cry or yelp, over and over. I quickly turned on our floodlights which lights up the whole backyard, and opened the door. I ran and jumped over a planter to see what was continuing to cry and I saw a very large coyote that had the little yorkipoo pinned down and biting her. I ran after it as fast as I could and the coyote took off.

I picked up the little dog and ran back inside to take a look at her wounds, as she was still alive, barely. She was bleeding from multiple wounds on her body and I tried to clean them off. I then rushed her to the animal hospital and they were able to diagnose her wounds and needs. She had 10 puncture wounds in her from the teeth of the coyote (a couple of them were dime size).

Needless to say, I wouldn't have shared this experience if it didn't have a happy ending. With antibiotics and other medications she has recovered and we have to keep her from running and bouncing around all the time.

How did this happen? First of all, we don't have a fence surrounding our property, which would have offered a preliminary defense. Secondly, I took my eye off her for about 40 seconds and in that time the coyote went in for the kill.

A few months ago I placed a trade and neglected to check for announcements. Zeal without knowledge! Within 9 seconds, after the announcement, my trade was down $45,000, and a Lobagola was not experienced, much to my dismay. I had only about half of the puncture wounds that our dog experienced. I survived too, but what a lesson! And, yes, I do feel like a yorkipoo in a pit of ravening wolves when I often trade. But I'm getting tough.

Kenneth Womack responds:

I too live in heavy coyote territory (both species). What I plan to ask my father on his next visit down to see the grand-kids is, what is the nature of a coyote?

It appears at once to be mostly opportunist, skittish to the extreme and easily agitated in the retreating sense. Yet there are times when I've seen them overly aggressive, and not always during times of urban encroachment. They seem to be perpetually hungry but their raw speed makes one think it could facilitate an easy meal at the drop of a hat…or chihuahua.

Either way, my sense of the coyote is not a positive one. There's something too rangy, too suspicious about them. And I do detect coyote-like behavior in some markets and their denizens. If coyotes could speak and write I trust they'd be employed designing Forex web pages and working as cabaret doormen.

Ken Smith remarks:

I am in touch with the critters. On a drive to the ocean I once saw a coyote on the other side of the road, a road kill. He hadn't been hit again and was still fresh. I stopped the car and got out to look at him. Dead as dead can be. But he was a predator with great cunning and I have respect for the critters. I opened the trunk of my car, put the fellow in, and aborted my trip to the ocean, returned home and buried him in my back yard. 

Scott Brooks explains:

Coyotes gulp meat while dogs chew.

Take some ground beef, put it in a plastic trash bag, seal it (so nothing can get to it), and set it on your roof for a few days, making it good and rancid.

Get a sponge and cut it into small fist-sized pieces. Get some cotton twine (it is crucial that it be pure cotton). Wad the sponge up into as small a ball as you can. Wrap it in the cotton twine so that it remains small (like the inner part of a baseball).

Then get a clothes-pin (for you nose) and some latex gloves.

Retrieve the rancid meat. Put the clothes-pin on your nose (it will stink), put on the surgical gloves, and cover the cotton bound sponges with the meat, making little meat balls.

Dogs chew their food (make sure the final product is between a golf ball and baseball in size), so they won't swallow the cotton/sponge part.

Coyotes gulp the food down. Rancid meat and cotton will break down in the coyote's digestive tract. The sponge will not. End of coyote!

Or if you're rural enough, put some rancid meat in the yard at night, get one of those "rabbit squealer" tapes and play it. Sit on your roof with a .22 or .17 caliber. Whack 'em and stack 'em.

Spread the dead bodies of the coyotes out along your property line. The coyotes are not stupid. They will figure out fast enough that the cost associated with the "trade" in the lamb yard is a much higher "vig" they may be willing to pay. You'll have to do this for a while, and again every few years.

If you're not rural enough, an arrow works just fine, too! So do traps. If you use traps, you'll need to be willing to follow up with an arrow or a .22.

Pitt Maner adds:

As an alternative to the medieval "sponge" method (probably quite effective) you might want to try marking your territory with wolf urine/scent. Coyotes have invaded many areas where wolves once kept them in check.


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