It’s Friday morning here in lovely South Pasadena, and that can only mean one thing, It’s Trash Day. The town has decided that we are so upscale, that we do not bring our trash out to the curb like other reasonable communites. We pay extra so the trash hauling people drive onto our driveway and empty the barrels where they sit. I don’t agree, but the Keep South Pasadena Unsightly contingent is strong.
What this means to your hero is that every Friday morning I need to get up and move Michele’s truck out of the driveway before 7AM. 7AM is when the trash haulers begin to arrive. I also tend to uncover the barrels to make it a little easier on the guys.
Today I moved Michele’s truck and went open the barrels when I saw a big mess. Some woodland creature had pulled a bag out of the trash barrel ripped it open to get to the contents. As I walked up, I saw this:
It was the turkey sandwich I tossed out after leaving in my briefcase overnight. The creature, I suspect a raccoon, smelled the turkey and made a beeline to it to retrieve a midnight snack.
Michele’s eagle eyes spotted this other telltale clue:
Tracks! Tracks on the hot tub cover. Again, I suspect a raccoon. Why? I don’t know one kind of animal tracks from another, but it’s much cooler to talk aboiut raccoons in the yard than boring, commonplace possums or cats. Those aren’t cat tracks!
I must ponder how to deal with this situation. This is the second time the raccoon has gotten into our trash barrels. I must think. Suggestiosn welcome.
When you come up with a way to politely get your racoon to move to another home, please share it to us. Unlike possums and cats or even rats, racoons are smelly, have very discourteous toilet habits and I hear they are fierce when threatened. We have one living on our roof or in the cyprus tree on the side of our house. We often open our front door to an awful smell. I no longer think they are “cute” except far away.
Polite?
Here’s my polite thoughts… I go buy a rifle and shoot the raccoon when he attempt to make a mess. Then, I make raccoon jerky for dinner!
Animal Control should be able to loan you a “have a heart” trap – aka “Live Trap.” When Mr. Raccoon gets trapped you can call them and they’ll come get it.
Of course this assumes your friendly raccoon hasn’t seen such a device before – I know somebody that has had baited traps like this “picked” by raccoons.
Good luck…
We have two raccoons living on a tree behind our house on the back hill. We can see them play on the branches. They are very cute from a distance. Years ago we had a family of raccoons living in our chimney. Michele and I were covered with itching little red bumps and we didn’t know what they were. To the doctor we went. We were told they were some kind of rash. Home we went packed with prescriptions for rash. Two weeks later, more itchy little red bumps. Back to the doctor. Fortunately, the doctor we saw in our first visit wasn’t there; another doctor in the office examined us. “Flea bites,” he said. Home we went. Exterminator was called. Tony whirled into action. He decided to get the raccoon family out of our chimney. He was on the roof looking down into the chimney. The raccoons were way down at the bottom of the chimney, which is about 24′ down. The chimney was dark inside and all Tony could see was four sets of eyes stared back at him. Tony pondered what to do. Chimney=fire. So fireballs of old newspaper (The Cincinnati Enquirer) were thrown down the chimney to force Mr. & Mrs. Raccoon and their 2 children out of our chimney. Somebody up there must love us and be watching out for us, because Tony did not set the house on fire.
We have garbage cans with screw-on tops. Which are impossible for humans or raccoons to open. Now we don’t have any more raccoon fights over our garbage or garbage can spills.
kkkkf
there is this frigin loser raccoon who keeps attacking our cats… the last attack cost us 2500 in vet bills.. so we are now inventing good ways to atract them into the yard so we CAN SHOOT THEM!!!! however, we have been unsuccesful, we are unsure of what time to best hunt them (weve stayed up all night) or if we should leav the lights on or not… we were even contemplating live bait….. (any ideas)… anyone with other fun loving raccoon ass kicking ideas please let us know.