We take calls at Humboldt Wildlife Care Center every day regarding a wild animal in trouble somehow. Often we can help over the phone, but sometimes we have to go to the scene. Last Tuesday, a phone call came in just after we finished morning tasks, such as feeding all our patients and cleaning their housing. The caller was distraught: a raccoon had gotten stuck in their warehouse. Somehow he was trapped behind a structural member of the building and the siding. Unsure what to expect, we sent two of our interns Lindsey Miller and Bekah Kline, over to see what they could do. After arriving Lindsey texted this photo:
Trapped at the bottom of a corroded post, unable to climb back the way he came and no way to move forward, if his paws hadn’t been visible it is doubtful that anyone would have ever found this guy. This predicament would have killed him.
The building’s owner drilled into the steel post above where the raccoon was trapped to gain access.
It took less than an hour to make an opening large enough to free the raccoon.
Once the hole was large enough, Lindsey pulled the raccoon up out of his jam.
She and Bekah secured the rescued Raccoon for transport back to HWCC/bax for an evaluation. At this point we hope that he will be in good health, able to be released right away.
The raccoon was uninjured. We offered him some snacks and observed him for a few hours to make sure that he was able to properly use his limbs and was fully capable to return to his free life.
Very near to the warehouse where he was rescued there was a suitable release site. Raccoons live everywhere that we do. Industrial areas, residential neighborhoods, mountain retreats… Raccoons are truly one of our most common wild neighbors, with whom we share so much, including a habit of misadventure.
LIndsey, after releasing the Raccoon she’d helped rescue. Wildlife rehabilitation interns get a pretty remarkable view of the world, not one that many see. Interns, volunteers, staff – all of us spend a lot of our lives looking, or trying hard to look, at the world through the eyes of our patients. We learn to see that the wild is always here, always near. We learn that at our very core of minerals and cells, we are wild too. It’s a simple fact that’s right here to be seen, and raccoons are just the ones to point it out.
Freed from a certain death, thanks to the compassion and the actions of the people who found him, our lucky unlucky Raccoon patient disappeared back into the wilds of Eureka’s first ward, just a few blocks from where he’d been found.
Your support makes rescues like these possible. Not all of our patients are cut out of steel traps, but each of them faced a certain death, caused in nearly every single case by some human invention, were it not for the generous donations you make, that keep our doors opened and telephone turned on. Thank you! And if you’d like to support our work, just click on the donate button! Your gift goes directly to the care of our patients, and efforts to prevent injuries in the first place. Thank you!!
As we posted a couple of weeks ago, it’s the time of year that the orphaned raccoons we’ve cared for over the Summer are reaching an age that we can return them to their wild, free lives.
We often talk about the efforts that we can all make to co-exist with our wild neighbors as well as the work we do to keep our patients wild. No cuddling, we keep our voices down when we work near them. We strive to respect their wild natures and to protect them from the harm that comes to wild animals who don’t have an appropriate aversion to humans and human activity.
Another thing that we work for, when it comes to raising orphaned wild babies, is developing ways for them to learn the skills they will need to survive on their own. This is the hardest task of all, and involves every aspect of their care! Housing set-up that includes natural elements to imitate forest, field, stream or ocean, as best we can, foods selected that are similar to what an individual of any species might eat, and presenting the food in a manner that will teach hunting or foraging skills are all important aspects that must be included.
For raccoons, this task is as complex as they are. So, at our last release we were very gratified to watch one of our patients, moments after release, make her way downstream about 50 yards and then, to our happy surprise, start fishing! We are thrilled to see our hard work pay off and to see this young raccoon demonstrate that she knows what to do when presented with a real field and stream.
Check out this 3 minute video of our latest release (including the act of catching her first wild fish) and enjoy it too, because it’s your support that makes this work possible. So THANK YOU!!
Exploring the wide and wild world!
Agility and strength – fostering these while in captivity is a challenge when raising wild orphans! Our staff and your support make it possible!
[We are still deep in our fall fundraiser, nearly halfway to our goal of $10,000! Last week it seemed we would never make it and now it looks like we have a fighting chance! Help us cross the finish line! Every donation is tax-deductible, and every donation, no matter the size, goes directly toward meeting our mission! Your help is essential! Donate today!
Thank you for being a part of this live-saving work. Thank you for your love of the WILD!]
video taken by Laura Corsiglia and Lucinda Adamason for Bird Ally X; all photos Laura Corsiglia/BAX
Raccoon (Procyon lotor) babies have a lot to learn. As adults, Raccoons hunt and forage for a wide range of food, from songbird eggs to berries to the salmon a bear leaves behind. Raccoons hunt small rodents, crunch on snails, and nibble the mushrooms on the forest floor. Raccoons are brave, resilient, adaptable and notoriously intelligent.
Orphaned Raccoons in their housing, prepare for the wide and wild world. To help them recognize the real world when they see it, we’ve provided them an artificial river of concrete. We call it the Los Angeles river. No substitute for an ecosystem, but at least they know to look for fish in moving water.
Raccoons have lived in North America for millions of years. This familiar wild neighbor has nearly as many names as there are indigenous languages. We use the Algonquian name, derived from arahkunem – which is said to mean “scratches with hands.”(1) Locally, in Wiyot, the animal “with the painted face” is known as jbelhighujaji (pronunciation).(2)
For a glimpse into their place in the ecology of Northern California, a Shasta story has Coyote and Raccoon living together each with five children. When a jealous rivalry ends with Coyote killing and feeding Raccoon to his children, one of Coyote’s sons tells Raccoon’s orphans what happened – they decide to kill all Coyote’s pups but the one who told them. Afterward they flee with the spared pup into the sky. Coyote tries to follow but cannot keep up. The six young animals become the Pleiades, high above in winter when no raccoons are about, and down from the sky in Spring and Summer when raccoons emerge with young.(3)
Taken to a remote tributary of a nearby river, rehabiliator Lucie Adamson and volunteers prepare to release the season’s first six raccoons back into their wild freedom.
Taking their first tentative steps into a world without walls. As kits, as soon as they began eating solid food, they were offered fish, mushrooms, plant material, small rodents, small birds, vegetables, fruit, eggs and insects, hidden under rocks and logs, hanging from branches. They know where to look for food.
It isn’t frivolous to consider the seriousness of raising orphaned babies of a species this complex, this storied, this ordinary, this mysterious. Here we are, as removed from “universal nature” as any species has ever been, yet it’s up to us to provide an education for these wild young things.
When we commit to the care of a wild orphan, we accept the responsibility for their wild education. To teach a wild baby to be wild requires an inhabiting imagination. We must see the world this young animal will see, and then provide the challenges that will teach the skills necessary to thrive in that world.
When we commit to the care of a wild animal, we are committing to the wild, to nature – we are accepting Nature’s terms – we are accepting, and in fact seeking, the blaze of reality. This is, as they say, a tall order.
Young, healthy and in a lush and resource-filled environment, these orphans will soon find out they are home.
Meeting nature’s terms does place the rehabilitator in an awkward position. Our towns, our cities, ranches, forestry, fisheries, in short, nearly all of modern society struggles to co-exist with the wild. Promoting co-existence with wild animals – this alone puts a person outside of most of society’s concerns.
Just released, this Raccoon finds something to eat right away.
To be an ally of the wild often puts a wildlife caregiver in opposition to the general dreams and desires of our human neighbors. Schools, shopping centers, highways, solar farms, windmills, none of these, no matter their merits, is a boon to the wild. Even though any of these promises to preserve the world, a wildlife rehabilitator doubts the proposition.
Experience, or maybe intuition, knows that people don’t preserve ‘the Wild.” The wild is the expanding universe and the cosmic sweep of galaxies, it’s the comet’s eventual return, the dividing cell, the grasp of the leaf cutter beetle, the gill, the hoof, the photosensitive tissue that finds these words on the screen. We see the strip mine, the copper mine, the mountain top removed for the coal beneath – the old forest destroyed – the old forest re-named “overburden.” Factory trawlers scraping the bottom of the sea, oil spilled from exhaust into the suffocating sky – it’s hard to believe that modern society will preserve anything.
After nearly four months in care, a young Raccoon explores a real river for the first time.
Reaching the opposite shore.
Henry David Thoreau, in his essay “Walking,” offers what could be the wildlife rehabilitator’s complete philosophy, in eight simple words: “in Wildness is the preservation of the world.”(4) This statement is irrefutable. In some ways it is shocking that it had to be uttered. To rehabilitate wildlife, rehabilitators live by this simple truth, its utter grace and its razor sharp accuracy.
Everything emanates from the Wild. What else can the wild be if not the headwaters of existence? The wild could be called the real. We may as well say that in reality is the preservation of the world – not in law, not in hybrid automobiles, not in aqueducts, not in theology. The real presents itself. Wild allies follow as we can.
This year, at Humboldt Wildlife Care Center, BAX staff and volunteers have been caring for two dozen orphaned Raccoons. Our first litter of four, whose mother had been trapped and dumped miles away, came the third week of May. They were nearly three weeks old. Last weekend we released six youngsters who were ready to go. We still have over a dozen in care.
With startling speed the Raccoons dispersed into the forest.
It can be difficult, as caregivers, to prepare our charges to one day climb much higher than we ever could.
Each of these youngsters is learning to hunt, to forage, to climb, to hide when threatened. Each of these youngsters is fierce and determined. Healthy in mind and body, we release them into a carefully chosen site. Food must be present. Water, too. Cover against predators (Coyote is still looking for Raccoon) must be available. Room to roam – these animals must be able to disperse from this site, preferably adjusting to freedom and autonomy before encountering a backyard and the get-rich-quick scheme to be found in humanity’s garbage pails.
For the release, the six Raccoons were weighed, examined and put into transport carriers. We drove them to a remote location on a tributary of a nearby river. Once the carrier doors were opened, five of them sprung into action, heading for the river and swimming across to its other bank. Some climbed trees, others immediately searched for and found food (food we’d put there, but nothing like early success to build confidence!).
One Raccoon was more cautious. Our release team moved back from the site and waited.
At last, confident that the coast was clear, S/he left the carrier behind.
Forest riparian habitat is excellent for Raccoons. And it didn’t take this group long to figure that out. Now they’ve entered the real world. Will each survive and live long lives? No one knows. What we do know is that we’ve given these young wild kin the best chance we could.
One Raccoon hung back, not leaving the relative safety of the known carrier, poking her head out, ducking back in. Our team moved back and waited. Eventually, after many hesitating starts, she left the carrier and quickly disappeared into Reality.
All good things are wild and free. – Henry D Thoreau
Your contribution makes the care of orphaned Raccoons, and all of our wild neighbors who need our help, possible. Please donate. Thank you for being a part of our life-saving work.
Exploring the wide and wild world!
Agility and strength – fostering these while in captivity is a challenge when raising wild orphans! Our staff and your support make it possible!
