I often scatter a bit of cat food on the porch for the raccoon that comes to dine, while cat sits inside the glass door to watch. Cat and coon observe one another with much interest, sniffing and smooching thru the glass.
For me, it’s better than TV.
Raccoons are ... such fun. BG (Bandit Girl_ came around three or four years ago in June, four hours before sunset, half starved, obviously nursing babies. I fed her daily thereafter. She rings ‘the door bell’ I put on the backdoor handle (a chocolates can tied to a shoe lace, hanging from the handle on the inside). First week in July she brought the whole litter (5 curious kits) and of course I named them all. Of that litter, only Buster continues to visit. He is full grown now and when he comes tot he backdoor he stands on his back legs and can look right in the nine-pane half glass door! When he was little, he would climb into my lap for an oatmeal cookie. He’s too big for that now, but he does take cookies from my hand, and always touches his nose to my hand ... I guess as a greeting.
Anyway, BG had another litter the next year and brought that gang to the back deck for feeding and frolick. One of that bunch, Mischief, now has a litter I have yet to see, but she comes every afternoon and rings the bell for her food and water. She takes cookies from the hand also, and does that nose touch to the hand with the cookie. I suppose she will bring the gang when they start following her out from the nest, wherever that is. Her brother, Rascal, usually appears an hour or so after she has fed. He is more insistent for the cookies.
I confess to recycling lots of food trash for them but nothing with bones in it. It used to be the crows but don't see them too much any more since West Nile and maybe the city got ours.
I can't stand to put stinky stuff in my trash and my pipe in the basement is only 2" so I'm careful what I put in the garbage disposal. So I stick it outside and it's gone by morning. My neighbor doesn't seem to mind and has been throwing stuff out on the ground, too.
I doubt there's a natural shortage of food for them but they are always happy to get a handout, and I think coons are especially cute but decided you don't want to try to tame a baby for a pet. I've got a couple possums that come around, too. They are kind of ugly but I have grown quite fond of them.
Whoever gets there first. Tonight it will probably be pizza crusts too tough to chew.
I forgot my squirrels. I just love them. Well we don't have too many. But there is one little black female. My daughter saw her nursing two brown babies up in my birch tree where she has one nest.
Well, she got comfortable around me but I haven't tried to get her to eat out of my fingers like I have others. I named her Zoey, and she was coming when I called her. One day I was late putting out the wild bird mix she loves, had the new package out in the trunk.
So I go out with my plastic snow shovel which I need for help to get up and down steps and start for the street. She scampers along right behind me. She wasn't afraid of the shovel. I got the seed and she scampers along behind me back to the house and waits patiently while I take it inside, open it and scoop some for her. I take it out and scatter it on the stoop. I learned not to scatter too far or she will back up because it gets in her face. It's just so cute; I hate it when I lose them.