Raccoons. They’re cute (especially the babies). They’re clever. But when they make your home theirs, they’re nothing short of a menace! The interesting thing about raccoons is that they are not really “wild” animals. They are like rats, unwelcome urban neighbors. Raccoons are scavengers and thus, they are far more common in our cities and suburbs than they are in the wild where they’d really have to work for their supper. You might ask, if they’re so common, why haven’t you seen any until it became a problem for you? Well, first of all, they are nocturnal, primarily anyway. Secondly, they’re cautious animals. That means that if the see you first, they’ll hang back under cover and remain unseen. Raccoon-human environment encounters are very common with most flying in under the radar. There might be a whole family of them feasting in a restaurant dumpster down the street with no one to know the wiser until said business closes for good and the raccoons are force to find calories from other sources. If you live nearby, you’re about to become host to a terrible house guest! Among the key attributes raccoons possess are agility, cleverness, curiosity, and great resourcefulness. This means you’re going to have a devil of a time keeping any raccoon away that has targeted your property, but don’t despair; there are things you can do to be less hospitable and make them someone else’s problem (sorry neighbors, you should read this blog too!).
To minimize the damage raccoons can cause at your home, we need to address the things they like most. This time, we’re going to talk about what every organic creature needs on the planet. Food. It’s a very good chance it’s a food source the raccoon that is setting up camp at your place is after. It might be your garbage, a compost heap, the food you leave out for your cat (one you own or a stray, the raccoon doesn’t care!), the doggy door you leave open that lets the raccoon in to eat food in your house, bird/squirrel feeders, or even a vegetable garden. If it provides sustenance and is left unguarded, it’s like leaving out a welcome sign for these guys.
You might be thinking about some sort of motion detector flood light placed in a strategic area to mitigate raccoon behavior. In most scenarios, this won’t work. The sensitivity would have to be turned up pretty high and would create a ton of false alarms or possible staying on all the time and failing to alert the home owner or startle the animal. That said, there are some interesting devices on the horizon coming out of IoT, also known as the internet of things. Your home’s wireless network can now use the power of cloud computing to capture photos and video of your home or business’s surroundings and through an upload of data, analyze what is being seen and create an appropriate action. Turn on a sprinkler zone? Yes! Fire an air-jet? Right on! Motion track a bright light? Absolutely! And all of this can be reported back to your smart phone. While this may sound like an escalation of the groundhog war waged in Caddyshack, it’s really about protecting your property and peace of mind. If you live in a neighborhood with a homeowners association, you might have to go into work late or be subject to fines if your garbage is strewn about your lawn, or heaven forbid, the lawns of your neighbors. One too many late days at work can cost you a raise or promotion. And to think, your CLE, or Career Limiting Event, was caused by a raccoon!
You’re probably getting mad just reading this article, wondering if it’s been a raccoon all along that has cost you in your career, forcing you to work extra years, maybe even into your retirement. Well, they’re clever, but not that clever! The truth is, we have some things we need to do to dissuade these creatures from having a house party at our expense and that takes some time and effort to put all these things into place. That said, it might just be easier to trap and relocate the nuisance raccoon and in the hands of a professional, I would agree. However, for the do-it-yourselfer, these crafty varmints can prove to be elusive and frustrating at best. While there’s no shortage of animal traps available to try and capture these bestial troublemakers, pulling it off successfully is another story entirely. Give it a go but don’t expect without a lot of trial and error, and maybe a good dose of luck, that you’ll be able to apprehend yourself a mask-faced prisoner. And that’s where we come in.
If a raccoon is still causing you trouble despite repeated attempts to secure your environment and capture and relocate them, please contact us right away. Trapping is hard work if you don’t have the experience. Let the problem be ours and you can go back to enjoying your yard, property, and maybe even the “game” on TV. We’re happy to take care of these issues for our customers in a humane way that benefits the homeowner and the animal. Contact Emergency Pest Patrol for raccoon removal service and ask us for pricing and schedule a service call ASAP. You’ll be glad you did.