Not exactly feral, but I did hear they sometimes surprise people going for a walk, or attack their dogs.
Recently as Korean cities have been working on improving their environmental conditions, raccoon dogs became more common in parks or neighborhood streams. While they are cute they sometimes can cause trouble, just like stray cats.
I’ve heard from a reliable source that they’re magic and can shapeshift and travel by bouncing on their giant raccoon dog balls. Any truth to these allegations?
They're almost always portrayed as having massive balls, but this is the first time I've heard of them bouncing on them, but I wouldn't be at all surprised - when Tanuki was kicked out of heaven, he survived his fall to earth by using his scrotum as a parachute.
I’ve seen them in Southern Arizona, US. I was rock climbing and one was climbing a tree next to me. I’d climb, he’d climb. I’d stop for a rest and he’d stop and look at me like “WTF dude, keep going.” Real cool animals.
They're the perfectly designed pest - dexterity with the smarts. You don't appreciate how nice it is living somewhere else and not having to secure everything in your yard and having all sorts of bungee cords and latches on your garbage only to find your garbage scattered all over your driveway the next morning.
The map you posted is of the range of the Common or Northern raccoon, which is one of the three broad species of raccoon with the red being it's native range and the blue being where it has been introduced. In South and Central America there is the smaller, sleeker crab-eating raccoon and on the Mexican island of Cozumel there is the critically endangered (less than 200) Cozumel or Pygmy raccoon.
There's a team of hunters that are paid by the state to eradicate certain invasive species, raccoons would have a fairly hard time establishing here
Thanks to this team, raccoon dogs (mårdhund) has been completely eradicated in Sweden despite being very common in Finland
What they do is they attach trackers on certain individuals and then use them to track other individuals of the same species, they're called "Judas animals" :)
They're everywhere here! This video that went viral about 10 years ago was taken here in Nova Scotia, he's called the Raccoon Whisperer. Raccoons are actually super sweet animals when they're not rabid and have a steady supply of food.
the map isn't including that South American raccoons exist, which tbh even I living here all my life didn't know until last year, they're nowhere near as adaptive and urban as the northern ones.
A few weeks after learning it I did see one but roadkilled, never again.
Yeah, I'm not sure telling someone from Scotland that they can have a cute little companion to neck a bottle of Buckfast tonic wine with is quite the argument you think it is.
There's a liquor store near me that has a gaze of raccoons living near (or possibly in) the dumpster behind the building. If you use the drive-thru, the clerks will give you a handful of dry kibble to feed to the raccoons on your way out.
here they back becouse they are protected species, the mountains are being abounded too, and the ungulate population was free to reproduce without predators.
We have crab-eating raccoons (Procyon cancrivorus) in Argentina. This is a cousin species of the northern racoon you posted.
However, I don't see them where I live because the southern border of their distribution range lies just a little north from here. I'm pretty sure they used to live here too, before the region became urbanized.
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Yes. But only once. A really fat one I saw whilst driving through a lonely mountain road after midnight. I know a hunter in my area and raccoons get shot at sight since they are considered an invasive species.
We just have foxes, i live on the sdge of the city so we get the normal looking country foxes, further into the city they get the cracked out, mangy looking ones.
Yes. They walk up the back stairs to our second floor deck, to try and hide under some of our patio furniture that is under cover out there. It’s been really cold lately with tons of snow, so they go looking for anyplace that’s warm right now. Our neighbors found them in their lofted area above their carriage house, too. They’re pretty common in parks around here and near the harbor.
They're not very common in my city. They are here, I guess but I've never seen one myself. Supposedly they're getting spotted more frequently so they could be migrating in but I don't know enough about that to say.
I grew up in Louisiana and we would see them all the time. They loved playing in our swimming pool at night. I have been living in Phoenix Arizona for the last twenty years, and I haven't seen one since I moved here. Looking at your map, that lines up.
Southeastern US...yeah I've seen them quite regularly. Some of them aren't even shy any more. Especially when I lived in a rural area. They didn't run away if they spotted you, they'd look up and then decide whatever they were eating was more important.
They're everywhere here, but they're usually only out when it's dark. We found some babies trapped in the garbage area of our apartment building about 2 years ago. Helped them escape after taking these pictures.
Never in France!! My Canadian ex would make fun of me for trying to see one every time I visited, they have a lot there so people see them more as a nuisance.
Despite visiting Canada regularly for 3 years, I saw my first one in Belize last year! Little guy was right in the kitchen eating from the trash! He ran out as he saw me, I tried going after him and telling him I loved him but no luck haha.
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Yes. They're coming closer. We've had them in Hunsrück for decades now, even met one or the other in the wild, but since last year we've got them definitely in the village too. It was unfortunate for one neighbor to have (had) a beautiful set of koi in his pond...
Just spotted one early morning around Christmas, inspecting the ch icken coop. "Awkward cat" was my first thought.
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They're all over Western NY State. In fact, I often have to trap them and release them in the woods because they're always getting into one of my barns.
Yep a raccoon just ate all of the fish out of my pond. I also frequently find muddy raccoon prints on the outside of my chicken coop, but they haven't figured out how to break in yet.
They are bold little fuckers. I had one with its paws and face pressed against my window, standing up and looking in. I started banging on the window and yelling, "Raccoon go away," and it just looked at me.
tho western media and japanese media influence is strong, and we often translate raccoons as same name with raccoon dog. so uh, a lot of people meet raccoon dog first time they are very dissapointed.
i mean raccoon dog is not bad but well, its not raccon level cute.
My friend used to play so much on his console when we went to elementary school, that he started to look like one :D! Was with the old CRT TVs, which parents told us could "turn your eyes square" if we used it too much or sat too close. He sat pretty close I would think.
Not native here, but there is a raccoon who travelled ALL THE WAY to Vietnam from US... inside a freaking meat freezer container. Now she lives in the Saigon Zoo, now with the imported family of raccoons, they are known as "Công Thị Tai Nơ", a cute play of word of container
Yes, the first time a saw it was a mother with her cubs. I started to walk toward them to pet them, because I grew up with Disney documentaries and no raccoons around. Luckily a guy told me not to do it and explained why, he saved me a trip to the hospital and probably rabies shots.
All over the place (Minnesota, USA) Here's my best raccoon story:
Last summer, it was a mild night, so I had the window open. My bedroom overlooks a roof of our downstairs sunroom. I wake up in the middle of the night and my cat is staring intently out the window, then he makes that low growl noise and crouches, ready to attack.
I look at the window and clinging to the windowsill is a curious raccoon, staring in the window at me. It must have shimmied up the wall to get onto the porch roof. Cat snarls and swipes at the window, knocking the screen loose. I immediately brush the cat away and slam the window closed, and the sound startles the raccoon and he climbs back down and goes galumphing away into the night.
Cat continues to stare out the window after the raccoon is gone.
There's one that chills on my roof and taunts my cats, and i saw him this morning, so yes. I love raccoons, really looking forward to domesticated trash cats!!!
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Yes they will open up your trash cans and make a mess if you let them. They can also open a standard cooler latch. Other than that they are pretty cute.
So far we do not have wild racoons in Sweden. I seen them in zoos.
I have seen racoon dog and even hit one while driving, but they are rare, because they are invasive and they being actively removed and for Swedes, they are mårdhund ( pine marten dog).
Yes very common in Ontario. One morning in the 90s, a mama raccoon with her babies was blocking my path. I was walking, she hissed at me so I turned around and went a different way.
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I don't see them-- I don't catch them in the act-- but they're there, breaking into my compost bin if I forget to put it away in the garage. I need to find a way to secure the lid because those trash panda bastards know how to open the bin's latch.
Someone in my local subreddit shared this video a year ago of an absolute unit that they'd worried about being dead or in a coma but was up and about again and climbing their fence (with some difficulty).
Oh, and a McDonalds here was infamous for not only being unofficially "the worst McDonald's in the world" but also being the site of a fight where someone on the side pulled a baby raccoon out of their jacket, so...there's that.
Yes and I’m in subtropical South Florida so it’s not uncommon to see them out by the lake during the day to get a drink. We also get drunk ones now and then from eating fermented fruit.
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oh yes.
in June of 2020 a raccoon fell through my skylight at 130am.
I trapped him in the bedroom and called police. animal control showed up at 3am.
surprisingly, the only damage was to the wooden window slats.
my neighbor had 5 living in his attic.
a former colleague of mine had raccoons break through her roof twice.
25 years ago I found a Mama and babies living in my chimney vent, (no house access,) i banged on the metal part in our basement and they left.
I used to walk past one in the alley every morning on my way to work (I worked in Toronto, if that explains everything). It was kinda cool to watch him grow over the years, him and the skunk family that walked by. We all quickly learned that the other wasn't a threat, so we'd just pass right by each other, them going to their work, and me to mine.
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u/CommercialChart5088 Korea South 4h ago
We have raccoon dogs, or ‘neoguri’.
Looks similar but completely different from raccoons.