Masked Marauders: Dealing With Raccoons In The City

Broad + Liberty ran my piece on raccoons in the city.

You can read the piece via the link below or the text below:

Masked marauders — dealing with raccoons in the city 

Masked marauders are lurking at night in your neighborhood.

That they have a black mask across their eyes like a bandit seems appropriate, as raccoons are great thieves. They are intelligent creatures and dexterous, so they are able to pry open shed doors and pull off trashcan lids to root for food, leaving the homeowner to clean up the mess the next morning.

Their facial masks, those black markings across their eyes, allow them to see more clearly at night. Raccoons are nocturnal and omnivores, meaning they prowl at night and eat almost anything they can find. Wild raccoons have adapted well to city life, but most city-dwellers have not adapted well to them.   

Raccoons carry diseases that can be spread to humans and pets, including rabies. Raccoons will also fearlessly attack you and your pets if you come upon them, especially if they are guarding their offspring, called kits.  

As my wife and I were sitting in our living room in South Philadelphia watching television the other night, I heard a woman outside of our house scream. I picked up my firearm (I am licensed to carry in Pennsylvania) and ran out the door as I heard a second scream from a man. 

As I raced outside, gun in hand, I saw my neighbor chasing a fairly large raccoon across his sidewalk. The raccoon climbed up a tree with incredible speed and skill and got away from my neighbor who was armed with a small shovel. 

I asked him what happened, and he said that the raccoon had charged his wife and their small dog as they were leaving their house. He showed me his surveillance video, and I saw the raccoon charge up the steps to the porch as his wife and dog were coming out. She screamed and her husband came out and bravely reached down, grabbed the raccoon and tossed it off of the porch. Amazingly, I saw the raccoon hit the sidewalk and then it raced back up the steps to the porch. The husband then raised up his arms like a bear and yelled. The raccoon turned and raced across the sidewalk and up the tree. 

The family and the other neighbors who came out were shaken. It seemed like everyone had a raccoon story. I certainly did. 

A few years ago, my daughter’s dog, a medium-sized, black-and-white mixed-breed, was staying with us as she and her husband went on vacation. Mickey was a highly intelligent and loveable dog. He was also very protective of his family, or pack, which included my wife and me as we often kept him at our house. I called him my grand dog.

I’m a night owl and I tend to work in my basement office and library late at night. Whenever I came up to use the bathroom in the laundry room behind the kitchen, Mickey would hear me and he would leave my wife’s side in the bedroom, trot downstairs and greet me like he had not seen me in months. It could also be that I usually microwaved a hot dog and fed it to him after he did his business in the yard.

On this particular night, I opened the back door and let Mickey out. He saw the raccoon before I did and he let out a low, mean growl. The raccoon, which was roughly the same size as Mickey, stood his ground and made some kind of a sound. Mickey charged the raccoon and bumped his thick chest against the raccoon, sending it back a foot or so. The raccoon “turned tail” and attempted to flee my yard but Mickey jumped on its back. The raccoon, trapped under Mickey’s pounding heavy paws, attempted to reach around and bite the dog and the raccoon’s outstretched long claws attempted to reach back and cut Mickey. But Mickey, a strong dog, continued to lift and pound his front paws repeatedly on the raccoon’s back. 

I was armed with my hammer-less .38 Ruger revolver and I wanted to shoot the raccoon before he harmed Mickey, but the two animals were tussling, and I was afraid that I might accidentally shoot Mickey. Instead, I yanked on Mickey’s collar and lifted him off of the raccoon’s back and the raccoon tore out of my yard and up over the fence. 

Relieved that Mickey was not hurt, I took him back inside my kitchen and I took a flashlight and carefully inspected him for bite marks and scratches. Thankfully, I saw none. I then microwaved two hot dogs for my heroic dog, who wolfed down the hot dogs victoriously. 

After this encounter, I did a bit of internet research on dogs and raccoons, who are natural enemies, and I discovered that my pulling on Mickey’s collar to break up the fight was the wrong thing to do. By holding him by his collar, I put him at a clear disadvantage in the fight, and the raccoon could have bit him or tore his sharp claws across Mickey’s throat. Thankfully, the raccoon chose to run off.   

So how can homeowners rid themselves of wild raccoons?

The city won’t help, unless the raccoon has rabies and it is a public health issue. A rat is a different story, as the city will send someone out for a rat sighting. For a raccoon, one must hire a private company to trap the raccoons and they then will release them out in the wild somewhere. It is not a cheap service. 

One can legally shoot a raccoon if they are super destructive to your home, such as causing serious damage to your attic, you shed or your home. But one has to be very careful about discharging a firearm in the city. There are many requirements about where you can legally fire your weapon, and there are many requirements about when and how you can kill a raccoon.   

Perhaps my neighbor’s idea of raising up your arms like a bear and yelling madly is the best option.

Paul Davis, a Philadelphia writer and frequent contributor to Broad + Liberty, also contributes to Counterterrorism magazine and writes their online Threatcon column. His work has also appeared in the Washington Times, the Philadelphia Inquirer and Philadelphia Weekly. He can be reached at pauldavisoncrime.com  

Note: Below is a photo of my late grand dog Mickey, who sadly died at eight years of age from cancer: