Every Spring it’s the same story: a Raccoon is seen around the home, going into a crawlspace, maybe heard in the attic… and the human resident opens the phone book to find help. A quick call to the pest control company and soon they’re spending a couple dollars paying for that company to trap the Raccoon.
The Raccoon, eager to find food, is easily trapped (maybe not on the first try though, maybe first some other animal is trapped and loses his or her life too). The pest control company takes the Raccoon away (to be killed) and soon after, a day, two days, three days, Humboldt Wildlife Care Center gets a call: Raccoon babies can be heard behind a wall, next to the tub, in the attic – somewhere, making their small chattering sounds, hungry, cold and dying. We take those orphans into care. Without charge. these are the lucky ones, the ones who are found. How many Raccoon orphans starve to death under houses and in attics after their mother has been trapped or shot is just anther unknowable tragic cost in world full of them.
This is exactly how our first Raccoon babes of 2017 came into care this weekend. Two days without their mother, who was trapped and killed, these babies are facing a terrible deficit. Warmth, fluids, and a gradual introduction to formula, which will sustain them until they are weaned in approximately 6 weeks, is the first step. If they make it through this process and recover from hypothermia and dehydration they’ll have another 10-12 weeks in captive care, learning to climb, hunt, fish and forage: in short, all the skills that their mother would have taught them. If all goes well, sometime in September or October, hopefully we’ll be posting a story like this one from a past Summer:
Killing mother Raccoons can be costly to a homeowner, and obviously the cost to the mother Raccoon is the greatest that can be paid, and the cost to her babies is higher than we’d wish on any youngsters. Yet, it happens every year, in every community, in every county, in every state. Every year we put out messages and pleas to not trap wildlife, especially in the Spring. In Spring, trapping a wild animal invariably leads to orphans. It is senseless, stupid and needs to stop. We need your help. Spread the word. Trapping is cruel, costly, immoral and ineffective. If you have a conflict with a wild animal, seek humane help, such as we offer every day of the year.
On this Mother’s Day, how about spreading some of that love and appreciation to wild mamas who need us to learn to live with them peacefully and humanely.
If you’d like to contribute to the cost of caring for this unfortunate mother’s young, please donate here now. Thank you!!
