Check out these animal jobs images:
20110405 - raccoon #6 - 0 of damage, promptly escaped - IMG_2918
Image by Rev. Xanatos Satanicos Bombasticos (ClintJCL)
This guy escaped within 2 minutes of this picture being taken, due to Carolyn setting the trap up wrong AND clipping the wrong part of the trap closed. These traps are only so good. Unfortunately, the rear "door" (left in this picture) can be escaped from if you push hard enough to bend metal, which raccoons do. Carolyn clipped it (not part of the original cage) on the top-left instead of the bottom-middle. It is metaphorically like trying to keep a door from opening by tying a rope around the hinges -- it just makes no sense. :) (Admittedly though, someone not experienced with the trap would probably make the same mistake. But we've been using this trap for years.)
But then Carolyn noticed that she hadn't set the trap correctly either. (Setting/baiting the traps is her job, dealing with the wild animal and repair contractors is my job, and I'd gladly trade.)
Lessons learned for next time! If I set the cage outside, I'll set it with the rear facing a wall, so it can't be opened. Maybe put it between a rock and a hard place so there's now way out. And the rear "door" (kind of a design flaw, really) is now clipped correctly. And Carolyn has already re-deployed it, correctly set up.
Anyway, it was NOT a fun 30 minute ordeal at 6:30AM while both of us were sleeping. especially since it resulted in nothing other than the acknowledgement that we just failed to capture yet another raccoon that did yet another 0 of damage to our house. If anyone wants to pay for my house repairs, you can have my raccoons. Otherwise, I'm going to figure out how to most easily kill them, because they home up to 5 miles and come back and continue to damage your property.
This fucker ripped off the opposing soffit to our addition; when this happened last time, it cost 0 to repair.
My largest hunting knife was right there, open-bladed, laying in the attic, a foot from this varmint. I had an opportunity to plunge its blade into this fucker's brain, but no, I didn't take it. (Actually, it wouldn't be possible to stab through a cage....)
Seriously, though -- how does one swiftly kill a raccoon in a cage so that it doesn't suffer? I'm done driving these guys to the park -- for all I know this is one that we already trapped in the past. Anyone want to come remove the bags of shit in my attic? No? Fine. It's just going to sit there forever. My 0 ladder is not tall enough to get to the soffit to fix it from outside -- and it's rather perilous to get to that point within the attic (only really possible without a major hassle due to the attic ladder we installed this year, which was in response to raccoons).
I just them dead. All of them.On the entire planet. I would press an extinction button in a second without a thought. Destroy all raccoons.
So can I drown them? I have a plastic tub outside. That seems really drawn out and mean, but it can be done while they are still in the cage without having to touch them or make a bloody mess.
I can't shoot it with my gun because it's not legal to fire my gun on my property. And it would be a bad idea to drop them into my well, where they would stink up my emergency water supply.
And no, before you ask -- animal control does not do anything in this situation. If it's in your attic, it doesn't fall under their jurisdiction, and if it is trapped, it does not fall under their jurisdiction.
Incidentally, the wooden "stakes" are the old tripod legs from my childhood telescope (which was my dad's childhood telescope). We recently decommissioned it (I keep the screws from things I throw away, they often come in handy later). I decided to keep the stakes. Figured they'd come in handy. Naught but a week later, I'm using the stakes to make sure it's mouth can't get near the handle of the cage. Don't want raccoon rabies. Although they have only killed one American in history, I still don't want raccoon rabies. I'd be the type to not go to the doctor and become the 2nd one to die from it... Anyway, I'm amazed how random pieces of wood find uses in the strangest situations.
cage, raccoon, stakes, trap, tripod legs.
trapped.
front yard, Clint and Carolyn's house, Alexandria, Virginia.
April 5, 2011.
... Read my blog at ClintJCL.wordpress.com
... Read Carolyn's blog at CarolynCASL.wordpress.com
Courtney and Snookie, Wisconsin
Image by Animal Farm Foundation2012
I was an interior designer
Now my mom saves dogs like me for a job
