There are believed to be in excess of 100,000 of Procyon lotor in Toronto. In some areas of the city there are an estimated 150 raccoons per square kilometre. If any people know how to deal with them then it should be the residents of one of North America’s largest cities. They don’t – although many have tried.
Oil of mustard, mothballs or moth flakes, cayenne pepper, or ammonia will deter the masked bandits, Fiona Venedam, a supervisor with Toronto animal service department, told Sharon Lem of the Toronto Sun this spring.
Squirt plants with diluted Tabasco sauce or sprinkle cayenne everywhere, suggested Eye Weekly’s Adria Vasil. For larger, frequently used areas like a patio (or patio chairs) try misting with a mixture of boiled jalapeño water every three to five days she says.
Military man, journalist and publisher Peter Worthington, another Torontonian, waited until nightfall then urinated around his deck. In August 2009, Renzo Facchinato of La Salle, Ontario, claimed in Harrowsmith this to be a sure-fire way to keep deer away. Alas, Toronto raccoons are tougher than Harrowsmith deer.
Another correspondent of Harrowsmith in New Brunswick says raccoons 'round his way hate the smell of vinegar left out in jars with holes punched through their lids.
When all else fails, try your mother-in-law. Mrs. J. Gobbett of Toronto recommends something she calls “Mark’s recipe for skunks, raccoons, squirrels, etc.” It consists of a bulb garlic, one chopped onion, two tablespoons Tabasco, two tablespoons cayenne pepper, 2 or 3 drops oil, a tablespoon dish detergent, and one litre water; liquefy all ingredients in a blender and spray on affected area.
It is unwise to approach a raiding raccoon. A few years back, a road worker from the town of St. Stephen, New Brunswick was attacked while patching potholes in the town’s roads. Subsequently he had to undergo a course of rabies protection inoculations. And raccoons can catch influenza – and pass it on to humans. Virologist Jeffrey Hall called the furry bandits the “Typhoid Marys of disease” in a study published the journal Emerging Infectious Diseases. When they use part of your garden as a latrine, they are exposing you and your family to the roundworms with which they often are infested. And although you are unlikely to be infected, distemper is the second-leading cause of death in raccoons. The leading cause, most Torontonians would concur, is probably road kill.
Raccoons have even spread with the help humans to as far distant points as Japan and Germany. In the latter country they escaped from fur farms to become Waschbären (“wash bears”) after their fastidious habit of washing their food in any available water. But in Britain? Late last June, a shocked resident in Chandler’s Ford, Hampshire, photographed a raccoon visiting his garden. Wildlife experts say raccoons are very rare in Britain and suspect it had been kept as a pet. Perhaps it was just visiting for the well known Brit knight life.
