Moving a young raccoon

[etpm]

I don't want to give my dogs the shot either!

Why?
Eric

 

[Dftodd]

We have raccoons that hang around our property.

They haven't hurt anything other then sharing the corn with deer and getting fat

Every now and then I'll see one hanging out in one of the trees watching me and pooch out for our walk.

 

[Dftodd]

Never had an issue with wildlife and trash thank God.

In other parts of the world, dogs are the predominant rabies carrier.

Can't blame an animal for getting rabies and wouldn't wish it on anything. Most humane thing to do is put it down before the disease progresses IMO.

That said, animals lack intelligence. My neighbor called animal control to report a rabid fox or something because his dog got into a fight with it. I asked him if his dog ever got his rabies shot. Told me no, and I explained to him what that would mean for his dog. He probably changed the story or told them not to come, but that was more than a couple of years ago and he still hasn't gotten his dog a rabies vaccination.

I reported a Grey fox for possible rabies.

I saw one hanging out in a rural area in the middle of the road.

When I pulled up with my work truck, it just stood there with a 1000 yard stare.

I cracked the window and yelled hay.

The darn thing started spitting and hacking spinning in a circle.

Didn't have my gun with me, or else I would have popped it right there.

Called 911, they were able to get a pin point of my position from my cell phone, and I gave them a direction it was headed in (Towards the rock quarry i just left).

Once I got off the phone with the 911 operator, I called my contact at the quarry and let them know they had a potentially rabid fox headed there way.

Considering rednecks in a rural area, I'm betting each one of their operators had a weapon in the equipment they were operating once word spread

 

[Suburban Plowboy]

I have had interesting experiences with raccoons.

I saved a baby raccoon I found squirming in my yard. Today, I have no idea what I was thinking, rescuing dangerous, destructive vermin. I turned it over to some lady who had a rescue facility. She held the coon in one hand and a drink in the other.

I trapped a coon because coons were making a mess with the trash and pooping in the pool. I put it in my trunk and drove it to the Everglades. I learned that releasing an angry coon is not very safe, so I will never do any kind of live release in the future.

I trapped a coon here because it was eating poisoned bait I put out for a squirrel that was eating my expensive aluminum gate. I held a rifle up to the trap, shot the coon in the center of its skull, and threw it over the fence for the scavengers.

Just kill them. It's not like they're working on cures for cancer. They carry rabies without symptoms. They kill and eat livestock and pets. My state has no bag limit on them and no season. You can shoot them at night with lights. You can bait them. The state doesn't care. It wants them gone. That attitude didn't arise in a vacuum.

 

[EddieWalker]

Racoons around homes usually become problem animals. I get a lot of jobs repairing damage that they do to the soffits from eating through the wood to get into the attic. Once in the attic, they like to build up giant piles of poop. They also pee all over the sheetrock for the ceiling and those stains usually require removing the sheetrock and insulation. Not a fun job to do!!!

Racoons will steal all the pet food if left outside. Once they get a taste for it, they will never stop, and always invite friends to join them.

A racoon will kill a cat in a fight. Maybe small dogs too, but I have big dogs that win those fights, and cats that have lost those battles.

If you have chickens, racoons will kill them. If they cannot get to them, but they can get ahold of one through the fence, they will tear its head off. If they can get to them, they will kill it, and carry it off to eat it. Then come back the next night, and the next, until there are no more chickens.

I know a few pest control guys who say that they catch them and drive them to the National Forest to let them go, which is over 100 miles one way. I'm not sure if this is legal, but I have even more doubts that they actually do this.

Most of the time I can catch them out and about with my game camera, or my dogs barking. Then I bring a flashlight and my pistol to take care of them. I've tried using traps, and most of the time I catch one of my cats. But a few times I've caught one that I took care of in the trap. I've also caught possums that I let go, and skunks that I let go. The skunks are terrifying!!!!!

 

[Suburban Plowboy]

When you live in the country, one of the first things you should do is forget all those Disney movies you watched as a kid and realize that a lot of things that live on your property need to be killed.

I started to feel bad about killing squirrel families, and then I spent over $6000 on damage they did to my truck.

 

[Hay Dude]

Chipmunks are cute as heck, but inflicted incredible damage to my barn’s wood siding.
Raccoons are vermin with high rabies probability.
Ground hogs are just a stupid nuisance that to absolutely ZERO good.

 

[dodge man]

I’m also the kind of person who doesn’t want to shoot animals for the heck of it. Groundhogs and ground squirrels get shot on sight. Raccoons I’m always on the verge of declaring war on but lately I’ve let them be. They tend to dig everything up.

 

[ponytug]

For those of you with additional vermin beyond raccoons such as possums, opossums are a carrier for a disease called EPM that can cause debilitating disease in horses if left untreated.

Unlike raccoons, opossums rarely carry rabies as their body temperature is too low for the virus to reproduce well.

We do everything we can to minimize attractions to raccoons, skunks, and opossums. No outdoor feed, no outdoor garbage, and no corn. When raccoons get angry they certainly put the fear into me. I think that for such a small animal they pack a whole lot of ferocity.

All the best,

Peter

 

[Jstpssng]

I went up to my shed and found a raccoon who didn't want to leave. The way she eas acting I knew she had babies so I chased her out, then found 4 baby coons with their eyes still closed. I knew I would regret it but wearing gloves I picked them up, moved them outside and left them in a box covered with a towel. When I went back they were gone.
Fast forward 3 months.
I had 6 pullets in a pen completely enclosed by chicken wire. One day I went out and only had 3, with piles of feathers outside 3 corners of the pen. I never did figure out how the coons got in and out.

 

[Suburban Plowboy]

You sound like me.

I killed a lot of squirrels. Then one day while I was working in my shop, a squirrel started gathering material for a nest and carrying it past me to a tree by my house. It wasn't scared of me at all. It took its time, making multiple trips.

I decided to let it live and have its babies, and then they ate my truck.

 

[Sigarms]

that coon will be back in your back yard the next day, because you fed it.

We are going to have to back to that reading comprehension of yours. I never fed it, nor did I EVER state that

And NO, there is absolutely no food around the house, and actually haven't had trash out for the last two weeks as well (because my wife's not home LOL).

 

[Sigarms]

End of the day, there is no food or garbage around the house, PERIOD Young coon never seen around the house. NEVER had a problem with coons before. Generally never have a problem with most wildlife, and if it does become a problem, it will end.

As I've gotten older, I've just got a distaste for killing it unless it's absolutely necessary, that's all. This coon by all it's behavior isn't rabid, and somehow it just ended up in my front yard at night (aways from the house mind you). If I can relocate it out back, I will. If it becomes a problem in any shape or form, than I'll go to plan B.

Thanks for your feedback everyone!

 

[Suburban Plowboy]

Hope you'll post pictures if you make a hat.

 

[Sigarms]

Hope you'll post pictures if you make a hat.

You'll be the first to get them plowboy...

 

[Yander]

Crying over a ground hog?Jeessh, as a teen I used to trap them for sport and club the fers in the head or shoot the little destructive suckers.

Can't imagine crying over a damn GH. I try to run them over if I'm in the truck.

 

[5030]

My 17 HMR scoped Savage is a vermin getting. I sit on the back deck and when they go to the cat food which I can see clearly from the deck which is about 50 yards from the barn, I get them in the crosshairs and pop them, always a head shot. Coons and opossums are very destructive vermin, especially in a barn so I eliminate them on sight. I take the carcasses down to the creek bank so the yotes can eat them and then I shoot the yotes as well. Yotes are a bit more difficult but my night scoped 22-250 handles them pretty well and it's open season on yotes here, no hunting licenses required either.

Sigarms... You get a coon moving in tpo your home (basement), you'll wish you had eliminated it. They have to be the most destructive vermin around and they poop everywhere as well.

Groundhogs are good eating if you know how to prepare them and so are brown squirrels. One of my hunting buddies makes excellent squirrel stew and roast groundhog as well.

Bag limit on squirrels here is 10 and it takes at least 10 to make a good stew.

I hunt them in the fall in the woods behind the house but I use a 22. That way they don't get tore up too bad.

Like I said, fair game for me is coons, possums and wood puzzies and the wood puzzies go to my buddy for roast groundhog.

 

[Jstpssng]

Crying over a ground hog?Jeessh, as a teen I used to trap them for sport and club the fers in the head or shoot the little destructive suckers.

Can't imagine crying over a damn GH. I try to run them over if I'm in the truck.

Go back and read my comment.

 

[5030]

FYI, both squirrel and groundhog, if prepared correctly are good eating. Being vegetarians, the meat is always moist and tender. I find the flavor to be somewhere close to whitetail doe's. In between a doe and a mule deer, but then you have to know how to prepare them.

 

[Suburban Plowboy]

Go back and read my comment.

Yeah, crying over a groundhog! That was pretty disgraceful!

This is turning into an urban legend.