War with the Raccoons

So Sunday night we hear this loud banging rumbling sound at around 3ish AM. I'm not quite sure what it is, but I really should find out. Our fear is that our furnace is about to blow up as it's nearly 30 years old and all. But first I check in Corwin's room as occasionally he'll go a bumpin' in the night. He was sound asleep, sans blankets. So I cover him and move on down the the basement and check the furnace. It's running fine as usual. No bumps or explosions.

I check out the front door and don't hear anything. I check out the back deck door. And there is a raccoon on the deck railing trying to eat the woodpecker suet cake. I run back in the house to get the camera, but when I return he buggers out down the deck support pole.

Monday night, he is at it again but this time he's after the seed in the swanky bird feeder. It really makes quite a racket as the tree is just outside of our bedroom window. But it's nearly empty of seed so we go back to bed when they quiet down.

Yesterday I refill the bird feeder and move it further away from the deck railing, hoping that he can't reach it there. More clattering sounds at 3 am again. Louder than ever. This time he's invited a friend to come along. As I look out the bedroom window one of them is in the tree, shaking the bird feeder for all it's worth. The other one is trying to get at the suet cake. I bang on the window to scare them away. They proceed to ignore me.

So I stumble down the stairs open the door and find one of them has taken off. But the other is hanging out in the tree, cool as you please. So I wander back in and find the little point and shoot, cause there is no focusing the DSLR in this dark. So I snap a couple of photos. Then I roar like a great ogre, flailing my arms. He just looks at me like I'm some lunatic. And a harmless lunatic at that, cause he isn't running.

I think the better of engaging him in hand to mouth combat, because he has sharp little pointy teeth and eyes that glow with the fire of Beelzebub. That raccoons dynamite! I think a broom vs. a raccoon will even the odds in my favor. I run in the house and get the broom and return to the deck. When I return he's advanced on the door, surely thinking he's scared me off. But when he sees me return wearing nothing but glasses and boxer briefs wielding a green broom, he knows it's better to cut his losses and run. I swing at him whacking the deck a few times but he gets away. As he stops halfway across the yard to glare at me, I whack the deck railing again with the broom making a most satisfactory sound. He hightails it for the forest after that.

As I return to bed, victorious, Anke tells me that I'm much louder with a broom than the raccoon raiding bird vittles. Ungrateful wench. I bet she couldn't do half so well with a mop.