Racoon invasion
Moderators: Greg, Mark, mhrAJ333, JD
Well, once again I have proven to myself that every repair I do leads to some new problem. I had removed the skirting to re-level and repair the belly and while I had the skirting off a family of raccoons moved into the belly. I was working on some rather large holes in the belly when I heard a noise and looked up to see a large raccoon lounging in the insulation. In my ignorance I poked and hit her with a stick and got her out and chased her a long ways off. to keep her from getting back in I temporarily closed off the open skirting with chicken wire. She hasn't returned but what I didn't know was she had 3 young ones in there too. They chirp and chatter all night waiting for mom to come back and seem to have no intention of leaving. I have one small exit where I have a Havaheart trap so that anything coming or going has to go through the trap. Finally after 5 days one of them went into the trap and I relocated him. The other 2 are still in the belly. I'm not too keen on being in the crawlspace with my face in front of those guys trying to get them out. The one I caught was just plain vicious. I guess with no food and water they will eventually die but that's not too pleasant either. there's all kinds of suggestions about using moth balls or ammonia or a loud radio. I tried 'em all. Nothing works.
Actually, I have a happy ending to the raccoon story. After 6 days they finally got hungry enough to leave and moved into my neighbors shed. She's been feeding them cat food and tuna and they are very happy to stay there. The lesson here is to never ignore a hole in the skirting. This has been a very stressful and sleepless week. Now my underbelly is ripped and the insulation has been torn up and matted down so it's on to the next repair.