terrible turnip vs minfernal

i've had an alt parked in felwood at the minfernal spawn point for a while now, and try to check in once a day or so. usually all i find are a few other high-level characters, all chilling out on their flying mounts. but last night when i popped in i was all alone. except.... two pets showing up on the minimap! a quick mouseover showed the first one to be a tainted rat. phooey. but the second one, glory of glories, was a minfernal. huzzah! another quick look around to make sure no one would steal it from me, and then a quick check of which three pets i had up.

this part is important. if you have been lucky enough to farm up a terrible turnip, then i strongly recommend that you level him up. reason being, he is the only pet with weakening blow - an attack which cannot reduce its target below 1 health point. it cannot kill them, as long as you remember not to any of its other attacks - definitely do not hit leech seed! this makes it ideal for capturing lower level pets, but only if you've leveled him high enough to beat them. good news is, i've gotten mine up to 20, specifically for this purpose.

sure enough, i send in the veggie and pretty soon mister demon is sitting pretty with minimal health. throw a few cages, and bob's your uncle. (anybody know where that expression comes from? i mean, wouldn't uncle bob have been your uncle the whole time anyway, regardless of how things turned out? or is it just a metaphor for, i dunno, bricklayer tools or something?)

so, one step closer to kalimdor safari. the minfernal himself was poor quality, but meh. he still looks cool following me around in stormwind, and i've got some rare quality magics in my roster already.

do i have any tips for catching this elusive bugger? just be patient, i guess. i hear they're more likely to be out right after a server restart, but pretty much everyone looking for one will have heard this too, so i expect there'd be a crowd. i found mine about five o'clock server time (my server anyway - no idea if cross-realm zoning shifted me or not) on a sunday, and as far as i know there hadn't been any restarts all day. so maybe the trick is to keep checking at times when other people won't be, until you get lucky. however you do it, good luck and good hunting!