Raccoon eating food

Hey All,

I have a stray male cat that we feed inside my shed. I have a camera inside so that i can make sure he eats. However i have noticed that I have two raccoons that are now coming in and eating his food.

Now the raccoons are kinda cute, but i would rather not have them where the cat is, plus they eat a lot of the cat food.

Is there any advice on what to do ?

The best option is to put a radio outside in the shed with music on. It should make them want to stay away.

Although they are cute it is not good to feed them. Raccoons only defense againstthe spread of rabies is that they are antisocial and normally dont mingle except to breed. But theey will come together if there is easy food but its just not wise for you or your kitty. (rabies passes through saliva) And since your handling the bowl and the kitty eats out of it, it puts you both at risk.

So your wise in not wanting them eating.

Give the music a try and let me know if it doesnt work we can come up plan B.

Mandie

Do you know if the same is true with possums?

I will look into it for you, I know it is different state to state. I just released my possie rehabs. (or are you asking if music will scare them away?)

Here is a Quote from one of my Rehabber friends.

"Opposums aren't a rabies vector species, meaning they can get rabies--just as you and I can--but die soon after contracting it (as we do) usually long before they have the chance to infect anything else. Feeding wildlife is a matter of your own personal judgement. If you feed them, they will come. If you're comfortable with that, okay, but I've had to trap several animals that one neighbor thought it was wonderful to feed them and other neighbors were freaking out because the animals, once a little too comfortable with the arrangement, became a little too friendly. Ultimately, in my opinion (and I'm a hypocrit when it comes to squirrels, it's best not to feed wildlife, especially if they become dependent on the food that your provide. If they have the food, their offspring will also consider you a food source, and so will their offspring and so on."

Do you any kind of routine with feeding him - putting the food out at certain times of the day, then removing it or do you leave the food out all the time?

I've been feeding a couple of fixed feral cats in my neighborhood for more than a year and really found the raccoons to be a challenge last summer. I started putting food out for a couple of hours in the morning, then bringing it in, and do the same for a couple of hours each night and bring the food in as it's starting to get dark. The two cats I feed adapted to the schedule very easily and we've been able (for the most part) to avoid the raccoons. Sometimes the schedule varies a bit depending on when I get home or other commitments, but the cats generally adapt to that too and seem to get plenty to eat.

this happened with our ferals too, we try not to leave any food out overnight; we put out food in the morning and possibly afternoon if needed. since racoons are generally nocturnal, they miss their chance to get any. also i adjusted the amount of food we put out to reduce leftovers.

As others suggested, don't leave food out overnight. Leave it out for a few hours then remove it. Raccoons usually come out at night. Possums in the early evening.

This happened to me, too.
Raccoons are very persistent and they will try to get to food no matter how well you hide it. We used to put foo inside of our cat house and made entry to cat house small and maze like that cat could go though but raccoons couldn't. They were out often even though they couldnâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]t get to food. They tried to destroy the entry to the cat house to get in. Sometimes they were even shedding blood to do that.
I finally trained my kitties to come inside at night and stopped putting food outside.
Then raccoons stopped coming.

Here is interesting website about raccoons can't jump but cats can.
http://www.thewildones.net/raccoons.htm

Good luck.

Same here - I have outdoor/altered/farm cats. They are fed during the day. I have one that comes around late at night (10PM), so I put food out then & watch for 15 - 30 minutes, then I pick the food up for the evening.

If you visit the thread below you will see a photo gallery showing what we did to prevent not only racoons but birds as well from eating the food we put out for stray/feral cats.

>>>>  Keep Birds/Animals Out of Outdoor Cat food   <<<<

One reason cities have placed bans on the feeding of ferals is because people do it irresponsibly, and therefore attract wild animals such as skunks, racoons, and coyotes, which pose dangers not only for domestic animals but humans as well.  The food MUST be made inaccessible to wild animals, and it can be done.  Please look at the gallery in the above forum.  It's post #14.

I also STRONGLY agree with what 'naturesgift' said, so I am re-posting it:

"Opposums aren't a rabies vector species, meaning they can get rabies--just as you and I can--but die soon after contracting it (as we do) usually long before they have the chance to infect anything else. Feeding wildlife is a matter of your own personal judgement. If you feed them, they will come. If you're comfortable with that, okay, but I've had to trap several animals that one neighbor thought it was wonderful to feed them and other neighbors were freaking out because the animals, once a little too comfortable with the arrangement, became a little too friendly. Ultimately, in my opinion (and I'm a hypocrit when it comes to squirrels, it's best not to feed wildlife, especially if they become dependent on the food that your provide. If they have the food, their offspring will also consider you a food source, and so will their offspring and so on."

Once you start making your yard, porch, garage, or patio a feeding station, don't be surprised when you attract more than what you intended!