Racoons eating my duck food but not my ducks?

[corriemartin]

So last fall I found I have 3 racoons living under the trailer across the street from us. I had the surprise of seeing them cross the road to their home early one morning.
I talked to my neighbor who owns the place (but no one lives there) and he is a big softy when it comes to racoons and doesn't want to kill or trap them. Honestly I'm not sure I'm up to such a task.
Because I have a lot of respect for and he is my neighbor I left them alone.
He told me they would only go for eggs and attack a mama if she was in the way. And he said they only come out at night.
I've never had any issues with these coons and until the snow fell and I saw their tracks I wasn't even sure they were still around.
I double secured my duck coop and I make sure they are locked up by dark.

Yesterday my son spotted one in middle of the day climbing down the neighbor's fence. And now I'm wondering... For two days in a row my ducks have been extra hungry when I feed them their second meal and for two days in a row when I went to feed them their dinner their food dish was empty. My ducks never empty their dish. I feed my ducks fermented wet feed, and all the ground shell and sludge goes to the bottom. Every morning I dump and clean this out, it's usually a good 1/4" thick. But the last two days the dish has been cleaned.
This morning I fed the ducks close to the house and let them out of their run since I can't see their run from my windows. They acted like they did not want to leave their coop.
So my question, is it possible or likely that a coon would climb over the fence into the duck run, eat their food and leave the birds themselves alone?
Other than locking my ducks up or putting food out for both them and the coon is their a good deterrent?
I'm afraid if I just bring the food in the coon will go after the ducks.
They've left my ducks alone so far and until the last couple days have not eaten their food.

Any suggestions. I really don't even want to go down the rabbit hole of trying to trap or kill these critters.
On top of which my neighbor who lives right behind me who has chickens whose yard the coons frequent has set traps multiple times and not caught them.

Just for fun here is my new dog going through some duck desensitization. She's outside quite a bit, I'm hoping she will help be a coon deterrent.
And yes, please forgive the dirty ducks. Tomorrow it's finally going to be above freezing and everyone is getting a bath.
View attachment 2982925

I have no answer on the coons, but I'm very interested in your dog desensitization program. We have a six month old puppy who completely ignored the ducks for the first several months we had her, but now is starting to think about chasing them. This is a "companion" dog. The LGD does a fabulous job keeping other animals away.

 

[littlecoopnextdoor]

one time a raccoon broke into my house through a screen door in the middle of the night and ate all my cat's food! my roommates and I made sure to never keep the big door open again hah! raccoons love an easy meal. they usually will move along if there's not any food. after I slammed my bedroom door the racoon scurried back outside and we never had any issues after that ha!

 

[samanthaoverton]

Dont think anyone mentioned this; raccoons carry a very bad parasite for humans. Wash your hands if you have been around their poo. They are a morphing type parasite that travel..and two can disable the human brain...raccoons maybe cute but they are dangerous parasite wise. Wash them hands. Also they will go after animals..we have gobs of them where I live. Can't stand them darn cute jerks. They will kill cats too..

 

[Bigtom Turkey]

Dont think anyone mentioned this; raccoons carry a very bad parasite for humans. Wash your hands if you have been around their poo. They are a morphing type parasite that travel..and two can disable the human brain...raccoons maybe cute but they are dangerous parasite wise. Wash them hands. Also they will go after animals..we have gobs of them where I live. Can't stand them darn cute jerks. They will kill cats too..

Not farm cats (at least not mine), only once has a racoon got they best of my cats... only once in 6 years and counting.