The Editor,
Re: "Raccoons attack dog," News, July 27. At the beginning of this year, I heard a loud knocking on my glass patio door.
I went to see what it was and as usual, it was my cat wanting to come in. As I opened the door to let him in, I saw in great disbelief a family or raccoons jumping over my fivefoot fence and come inside my back yard.
The five or so cubs were lead by their mother. It was clear to me and my cat, as we watched them from behind the closed door, that they were following the scent of my cat and not afraid to come up right up to my door. I made some noise and gestures until they got bored and left.
My cat has so far come home with three injuries and, several hundred dollars later, he is luckily still fine. But every time I let him out I take a gamble on his happiness.
Now, I'm no animal behaviour expert, but enough nature shows have taught me that babies learn from their parents, and if a mother raccoon is teaching her babies to put cats on the menu, we are going to have a situation, if not already.
I don't know what the solution is. I love nature and all its creatures and I don't want any harm to come to them, especially loved pets.
Perhaps a relocation of the troubling family would be the humane thing to do?
Jose Vicente
Richmond
