Raccoons

[cold before sunrise]

raccoons are so last tuesday.

[YojimboMonkey]

Raccoon Menace Continues

WILL NOBODY STOP THESE FIENDISH RACCOONS?

[diesel_powered]

Somebody needs to invest in a decent BB gun.

[jess]

Those rabid raccoons at least will be dead very soon anyway.

You know, I wonder if the whole werewolf myth started with rabies—people getting bitten by rabid wolves and then a month or so later, going crazy and violent and foaming at the mouth etc.

[hannah]

I think it's cuz when women menstruate they turn into real bitches HEYO

[clare]

Ugh. I have a really serious (and irrational, given that we don't get it here) fear of rabies, so racoons have always made me nervous. And bats. But this is the racoon thread so I'll stick to my dislike of them. Yuck.

Has anyone told Josh about these links yet?

[YojimboMonkey]

In fact I have but I'm beginning to wonder if he might not be a double-agent working for the raccoons.  And I wonder most of all why he just won't address the issue to put our minds at ease.

[clare]

Yeah, I just saw that! I thought I was the only anti-raccoon type around here, but maybe not? I mean, yeah, they are cute, but that's about all they've got going on. Oh, and thumbs I guess. Now I see the problem, theyre trying to take over the world and Josh is helping them! My god! We have to do something and fast!

[kyle]

Clare, my I direct you to this previous post:

Raccoon's do not have opposable thumbs, but they can rotate they're hind feet 180 degrees which allows them to scale down a tree face forward.

If they did have opposable thumbs, we'd be in a real heap of trouble.

Obligatory link to The Onion here.

[clare]

Ah yes, I recall that now. I had some vague feeling that I was wrong about it at the time... I still don't like racoons.

[Captain]

One of my former biology professors used to tell a story about a raccoon attacking his dog.  According to myth, the raccoon took a shovel to the head, a couple machete hacks and a couple rounds from a .22 .... and kept coming.  Story ends with my professor booking it with his dog in his truck.

Moral: Raccoons are fearsome creatures.

[Ignatius]

Yeah whoever said that thing about using bb guns as a preventive measure up in whichever thread is fooling him/herself. That is why we must make friends with the raccoons and not antagonize them. They will win.

[mixed cats]

We have one plant that we haven't managed to kill. It's in a big pot. It spends all winter in the house with Linus eating the tips off its leaves, and all summer on the deck.

Several nights in a row now somethingis coming up on the deck, tipping over the pot, and digging out all the dirt.

It's a raccoon. I just saw it! Scared it off by thunking on the glass door. Stop tring to give my plant rabies, jerk!

[Greg Nog]

Soon it will learn to not be scared of the thunks

[mixed cats]

If its gonna show up before I go to bed, I'm gonna open the door and throw something at it. Except the only throwable things handy are cat toys and nerf darts.

[clare]

Oh you should totally nerf it! get the disc one!

[davy]

Finn has this Nerf gun that shoots little lime green foam discs. If you get a direct hit, they've got some sting to them!

[bethany_m]

Fun Facts: Newfoundland does not have any racoons.  Or porcupines.  Very little roadkill diversity around here.

[Thermofusion]

When I was researching an over-ambitious hypothetical road trip to Newfoundland a couple years ago, I read a lot of grave warnings about 1,500 lb moose crossing the roads!

[Ignatius]

Only moose I've ever seen was a dead one on the side of the road. It didn't work out that way that time, but given its size, I'd say the moose probably had the better chance of surviving the accident.

[Ashley]

I just opened my back door to 5 little raccoon faces on my fire escape!  I live on the third floor and one of my roommates had left out a bag of garbage.  I closed the door because I was scared, and watched them from the window.  Then I opened the door and told them to get off my fire escape.  I had to tell them multiple times!  This raccoon family lives in my back yard - three babies and 2 adults - when we smoke cigarettes on the fire escape someone has to watch the stairs to make sure we don't get ambushed.

Also those posts are old but RE: Newfoundland wildlife -- I never grew up with raccoons!  There was a PSA of a raccoon mommy telling a raccoon baby not to eat mushrooms on tv when I was a child.  I see now how much more relevant it would have been had I lived somewhere with raccoons (instead I was told fairies would kill me if I destroyed their homes, and they lived under mushrooms.  So don't touch mushrooms).

[cold before sunrise]

I was told fairies would kill me if I destroyed their homes, and they lived under mushrooms.  So don't touch mushrooms.

this is great. grandma pat used to tell my mother that dragonflies were flying sewing needles that would sew her lips shut if she got too close. she's still afraid of them, despite herself.

[Javan]

I saw some raccoons at the weekend and thought of lptj:



they seem to be pretty happy lil' dudes!

[Greg Nog]

YESSSS THEY ARE GREAT

[Greg Nog]

Oh, also: about a month ago, I saw a raccoon in Central Park!  Just chillaxin' on one of the fenced-off lawns.  I tried to get a photo, but I was too far away for it to be anything more than a wee blur.