Raccoons are a species common to all parts, city or suburb, farms and forest preserves
Christopher Cudworth
Jun 26, 2009
SOURCE: Chicago Nature Examiner
People unaccustomed to thinking of raccoons as anything other than a suburban pest and frequent road kill victim would be pleasantly surprised to see a raccoon in its natural habitat, the woodlands and fields of rural Illinois. It's a much more pastoral experience.
Chasing a raccoon out of your garage or attic is no easy feat, after all. These animals are persistent and aggressive in seeking shelter, and if they choose your home as the place they want to raise their young, they can be sneaky and determined to "move back in."
Raccoons have even been known to chew their way through wood to get into an attic.. The cozy, dark confines of an attic seem like a giant hollow tree to a raccoon, an animal that in the wild would normally seek out a large oak or dying tree to use as a den.
Raccoons do not mind the dark because they are gifted with significantly better night vision than a human being. They are nocturnal animals, emerging at twilight to make their hunting rounds. When raccoons get together in groups or famlies to hunt, they use a series of strange yelps, wheeps and blood-curdling whines to communicate. If you happen to hear them outside your window in the middle of the night, the sounds can certainly scare you awake.
Raccoons always seem to be on the hunt for food. I have watched them digging in our neighbor's wet lawns for grubs, and in their normal course of wandering they will gather and eat both vegetable or meat. But I have also seen a raccoon make its way through the beams of my car headlights dragging a bright white bag of Wonder Bread. They can be garbage pickers, and a family of raccoons can easily strew the stinky contents of your garbage can all over the lawn or street. They have no problem prying off the lids of many styles of garbage cans. Some raccoons take a liking to bird feed and will bend and tear at expensive bird feeders to get at the seed inside.
We almost need to think of raccoons as minature bears who like garbage because it is a generally easy meal. Indeed raccoons share some taxonomic relationship to bears in their evolutionary history as a species.
Out in the wild raccoons live no less an active lifestyle. They den in hollow trees and often feed near creeks and streams where frogs, crayfish and other edible creatures form their diet. Still country raccoons will visit human habitations like farmsteads as well. Barnyard raccoons steal eggs and are not above slaughtering the occasional small farm animal for food.
I know from experience that a raccoon can make quick work of a small animal. A raccoon once entered our house and encountered our Norwegian silver haired dwarf rabbit that we kept in the three season room during the spring and summer. The raccoon killed the rabbit in seconds. Not for food, but apparently out of territorial aggression or surprise did this raccoon attack.
The ferocity of cornered raccoons might seem legendary, but they can make life difficult even for large dogs that corner or pin down a raccoon. After taking the photos that accompany this article, I met a copule walking their dogs and mentioned that I had seen a raccoon in the woods. They told me they would prefer not to have their labrador retrievers encounter a raccoon in the woods. "Those coons flip on their backs and claw the eyes of out a dog," they insisted.
In truth, most raccoons would simply rather be left alone. It is only because they are such opportunists that human beings have so many encounters
If you do encounter a raccoon in your home or somewhere else on your property, it is best to avoid a confrontation. Call a wildlife expert if you need to have them removed from your attic. Never attempt it yourself. Raccoons are fierce, intelligent creatures with a host of defenses; claws, teeth and a shrieking set of vocalizations that are enough to make your skin crawl. A family of raccoons outside your window at night can scare even adults.
But if you are fortunate enough to study a raccoon in the wild without being noticed, you will likely be impressed with their methodical ways. Raccoons are known to wash their food in water and use their strong, sensitive hands to turn food deftly as needed. Raccoons use their sharp teeth to chaw whatever they find to eat.
Raccoons climb well, have no fear of heights and will attempt to hide by turning their face and bunching up their profile if chased into a small tree. Their facial masks are distinctive recognition marks in the species, a feature they share with animals occupying similar niches in other parts of the world such as red-faced pandas and coatimundis. Raccoons are found throughout the Chicago region and there is no other animal that can really be confused with a raccoon in terms of size or color. Opossums tend to be lower slung with a white or gray color rather than brown, while skunks are clearly black and white. Badgers are not common enough in Illinois to be confused often with raccoons, and they tend to live in open meadows. Groundhogs are uniformly brown and do not generally wander around neighborhoods except to eat grass.
Our back door neighbors had a family of raccoons living in the drainage system in front of their house. Even the stout parents squeezed themselves through a 7-inch gap in the gutter plate. Later this same family moved into the backyard tree house. It took a lot of shouting and intimidation to make them move along.
In a few weeks most raccoons will have young kits following them around. Many of these families wander into the street at night and get killed by moving traffic. The animals are so common in the Chicago area that even hundreds of road kills do not seem to have reduced their numbers.
