Went out this morning and found Raccoon prints in the mud!

[stormylady]

Hi,
I went out this morning to feed and water, and all the food from yesterday was gone, and I found little (I think) raccoon paw prints in the Mud! All the birds were securely locked in the coop , so no losses there, but there will be the live traps set up tonight !
Lost 13 of my birds to them last year and wound up dispatching 4 Raccoons I don't plan on losing any more birds to them this year! I think it must have been pretty good sized to because the fence was bent over where the critter climbed in, seems like if it was a smaller type animal it would have just gone through the fence. I also found dig marks like a small hole (not deep) just looked like it was digging up worms or something? It was raining pretty good.
(the fence that was bent over was just a little 4 ft. Garden fence very light weight made out of Vinyl . )

The Paw prints were fairly small though, any chance that It could have been a very large rat? But why would it climb the fence?? Instead of going through the wire?

Could it have been a oppossum? Do their paw prints look like little hand prints too?
As soon as everyone is settled in this evening about 4 30 I will set up the trap, And keep an Eye on it.

Sandy

 

[stormylady]

Just looked up a paw print tracking chart and Rats are out. The prints don't match.

 

[mstricer]

If you are leaving your food out. You are inviting every hungary animal around. If they find a food source they will be back.

 

[stormylady]

Quote:
Thanks for the insight.

 

[Mattemma]

I would keep the trap set 24/7. I just got another possum today after 3 weeks of nothing. Glad to read there were no losses.

 

[stormylady]

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Thankyou, me too!! I plan too, I had two live traps to use , but I live in town and the last time I had them out someone came in my yard and stole one of them. But I will be sure and keep that one loaded every night from here on out. What works best for catching possums? I got my raccoons with PB&J sandwiches.

The tracks were small, but kinda fit both the Possum and raccoon track pictures so not sure which it was, I'm guessing possum? however two days ago I saw a dead raccoon at the end of the alley that was killed by a car, I think, so I really don't know. Not that it matters too much one way or another its got to go!

 

[bakerjw]

I didn't think that I had many coons in the area until I picked up a gamecam. I was amazed at how many night time visitors I was getting.

 

[stormylady]

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I know I had a couple of Raccoon attacks a while back and wound up trapping 4 a big ole Momma and 3 younger ones. A while back late one night I saw what I thought was a huge rat, it ran like one but now I was thinking it was a young possum. I think I'm going to invest in a game cam at tax time, maybe two, one for in the coop and one looking at the coop.

 

[Chicken Crazy12]

We just lost two runner ducks from the coons. Trapped one yesterday morning and we will see whats in the trap this morning. They ripped chicken wire to get in to my duck house. It's like last year all over again

 

[aprophet]

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possums have "thumbs" on all 4 feet coon have them on the front feet rat and squirrel tracks look a lot6 a like