"Local Idiot Learns Why You Shouldn't Continuously Feed Scavenging Pack Animals, Neighbors, Common Sense Vindicated"
this post was submitted on 10 Oct 2024
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A friend had 6 raccoons in her garage. She chased 4 out and then made a trail of dog food leading from the garage to the driveway, but she forgot that the trail also led from the driveway to the garage.
Gizmo caca!
It's not a hard problem to solve. Raccoons are incredibly smart, and if you stop feeding him, they'll eventually disperse. In the meantime, it's kind of a cute oafish story.
Feeding a wild raccoon isn't going to make it forget how to scavenge, or take care of itself. If you live in a remote area, probably not doing any long-term damage to their wild habits, aside from this one feeding ground they will have to move on from.
Apart from her not having a game plan for getting around a raccoon bum rush, the biggest concern I would have would be that raccoons are a reservoir species for rabies in the PNW.
Not sure when exactly this raccoon party fully kicked off, but their breeding season is spring and summer, which I believe coincides with a spike in rabies transmission...so....that's not ideal.