#1882 – Ransom
Posted on November 18, 2013 at 12:00 am by Chris
Chapter: Comics
I heard a loud sound outside and just like in a horror movie I went out alone in the dark to investigate. Nothing. I heard it again, and went out to find nothing. The third time I freaked out as a raccoon leaped out of my garbage can with gravity slamming the lid behind it.
Tags: garbage, garden gnome, raccoon
The only time I’ve heard scary animal noises like that was a long, long time ago. Before someone had told me what the noises could be, I thought that I heard a screaming child or something like that. Turns out the noises probably came from a cat (or two? Better not think of that for too long)…
According to a PBS documentary, raccoons in cities are getting smarter each generation, because the traps, locks and obstacles we set are selecting for the smartest racoons. It seems raccoons just learned how to blackmail.
I’m not sure natural selection works that quickly.
I once pushed a raccoon off my porch with a boxing glove tied onto a aluminum bat.
I have found that baby skunks sound like terrified (human) babies and a pack of coyotes sounds like a pack of 12-year-old boys. All in all, about what you’d expect…
In our area, it could be a bear (-!!-) in the trash. Have had a (juvenile) mountain lion around here, stalking the concrete lawn deer (fell asleep in a hedge, was tranked and deported to boonies!)
Canada?
Could easily enough be Alaska. Maybe Colorado or Montana. Or even rural California (which has cafe-cruising mountain lions).