365 Urban Species. #086: Raccoon

[urbpan]

photo by cottonmanifesto

Urban species #086: Raccoon Procyon lotor

At my job, taking care of caged animals in a woodland setting, the wild raccoons are my enemy. Early on I realized that I was at war with "raccoon nation," as I termed them. These crafty beasts are armed with intelligent minds and dextrous hands. They can climb any fence and can reach through fencing to grab caged birds. They eat nearly anything, and have a knack for an easy meal. Their ability to open trash cans, and to raid campgrounds, is legendary. Dave Barry has said that if we ever want to get to the planet Venus, we need to convince the raccoons that there's food there, and then follow them.

Raccoons are among the largest of urban mammals, weighing up to 25 pounds. They can survive in large city parks and wooded neighborhoods because they are nocturnal, and spend the daytime sleeping in holes in trees. They can live in almost any environment, but have a strong desire to be near water. Besides trash and pet food, urban raccoons feed on the fruit of landscaping plants, and on various small animals.

I'm hoping that cottonmanifesto will post her story of the raccoons in the Boston neighborhood of Allston.

Comments

[izzy23.livejournal.com]

urban raccoons feed on the fruit of landscaping plants and small animals.

Cool. Which small animals bear fruit?

Sorry--bad copyeditor instinct! Bad! Bad!

I love the pics. You should check out vyoma's journal--he's got a couple regular visitors to his back porch, and he's turned them into photo subjects. He hasn't been posting much lately, so you may have to go back several months to find entries.

I've read more than one cute sf story that theorized that after we wipe ourselves out, the 'coons will be the next species to evolve human-like intelligence.

[urbpan.livejournal.com]

Cool. Which small animals bear fruit?

!!

Very good! I'll fix that. I appreciate having many copy editors.

vyoma and I are old (livejournal) friends. I'm sad that he's such a good student that I don't get to read his journal very often. His Goodall-esque relationship with his raccoons is pretty amazing.

[mozzer131.livejournal.com]

Awesome! One night last summer, I was on my front porch in Belmont, and one came walking down the sidewalk, paused at my walk opening, and then wandered down my driveway to the back yard. I was shocked (and VERY my dog wasn't on the porch with me!)!

[mozzer131.livejournal.com]

Err...VERY happy.

See what happens when you get excited you remember basic HTML?

[harrietbrown.livejournal.com]

My next door neighbor was terrorized by raccoons. She left her house vacant for a few months, and when she came back, they had moved into the upstairs, and were busy tearing it up. A very nasty business. The neighborhood decided to enjoy the show and pulled up chairs to watch the raccoons climb around the roof at night. However, we mostly see possum around here. At least I hope they're possum. Otherwise we have a very big rat problem. Brrrr!!!

[cottonmanifesto.livejournal.com]

The reader's digest version:

We lived in the student slums of lower allston and we were lucky to have windows, but no so lucky that we had screens. We lived on the top two floors of an old house and, unless we wanted to bake like potatoes, we needed to keep the windows open. We also had a whole bunch of cats and their food was in a breakfast nook next to one of those open-so-we-don't-die windows. Something started eating the cat food and leaving muddy footprints on the windowsill. One night, I was sitting in my attic room reading a book when I looked up and saw a raccoon sitting in my doorway. It'd come in the nook window (I assume) and up the stairs. I threw my book in it's general direction hoping that it would get scared and leave but,no, it just stared at me before deciding to amble away. One of my roommates decided to try an alternative solution to the problem and he pissed on the roof right outside his (also open) window as well as on the outdoor stairs leading up to the back door (right below the breakfast nook). It worked!

[artemii.livejournal.com]

as many boston area pondkeepers have discovered, they will also eat the fish out of urban garden ponds!

[ex-wellread.livejournal.com]

I love the little guys! I haven't seen one in years. The last was on top of a dumpster and he looked pretty big. About 20 pounds or so. Probably well fed from stuffing his face with leftovers from that dumpster.

rocky

[(Anonymous)]

We have been getting a lot of raccoons around the neighborhood lately. Two nights ago, one crawled under the house and the dog was going crazy following it around the house, in the bathroom, by the floor heater, crying and whining, and then I could hear it trying to tear down the wall in my bedroom. Yikes. My son got a flashlight and looked in the crawl space and could see its eyes shining back. We left the door open to the crawl space for it to come out, which it did eventually. But last night, trash night, we were putting out the trash to the street and there were 6, yes 6 of them in the neighbors back yard! They are cute, but make no mistake, they are vicious if cornered. And don't let the dogs out. Buffy almost tore the screen off the front door trying to get to something, which with all the activity I now know it was rocky!