I believe it! -- Heck! Merely standing downwind of those critters compares unfavorably with exposure to concentrated HCN!

Best regards
HP

I never understood how pigs can smell so bad and bacon can smell so good!

 

On a day with still air the aroma of a truck full of hogs on the way to their demise lingers for several minutes. I usually park the bike on the side of the road and wait it out rather than trying to follow those trucks at a distance.

 

If another raccoon comes around I suggest you capture it and submit it to a brutal campaign of reeducation. Break its wild spirit, teach it who the beastmaster is, and bend it to your will. Make it into a pet that does tricks on command and plays nice with the cats (or else it gets the hose again). Raccoons can make cute pets, and they're smart.

 

Raccoons can make cute pets, and they're smart.

Yebut VLM/NLM/CN secondary to infection by (exceedingly pathogenic) baylisascaris procyonis is a real bummer! --- Generally speaking, keeping of wild animals is a bad idea on a number of 'levels'

In dead earnest
HP

 

I have six indoor outdoor cats (down from 10) not just one.

Who would have guessed? TCM is a 'cat lady'.

 

If another raccoon comes around I suggest you capture it and submit it to a brutal campaign of reeducation. Break its wild spirit, teach it who the beastmaster is, and bend it to your will. Make it into a pet that does tricks on command and plays nice with the cats (or else it gets the hose again). Raccoons can make cute pets, and they're smart.

Actually as a kid my mom tried raising raccoons as pets several times.

If you think they are destructive as wild animals who have a general fear of humans having them raised to have zero concerns about humans makes them 10x more destructive.

Unlike the wild ones tame ones will tend to hang around in the daytime and be a general pest if they know they can get food or attention and when they can't get they tend to occupy their time by tearing up everything they can find to keep themselves entertained.

 

Yebut VLM/NLM/CN secondary to infection by (exceedingly pathogenic) baylisascaris procyonis is a real bummer! ---

Aw c'mon. Doctors know all the risks, but are all those undecipherable letters impossible to rectify?
In other words, are you just typing out the list of all pathogens that might be available from a raccoon or is it entirely possible to have a raccoon without those risk factors, as would be the normal course of action prior to teaching it to ride a tricycle? (You wet blanket).

VLM: Very Low Morals
NLM: Normally Low Morals
CN: Chronic Nuisance
Baylisascaris Procyonis:
Oh. Round worms. Same as what puppies get from fleas?

 

Actually as a kid my mom tried raising raccoons as pets several times.

If you think they are destructive as wild animals ...

So is that a hard "NO?"
If so, that's a huge bummer because I was really entertaining myself with the mental image of you trying to break a wild adult raccoon like a stallion.

 

Who would have guessed? TCM is a 'cat lady'.

This post needed a warning: "don't read while eating or drinking"
Now I have coffee spittle all over my keyboard.

 

So is that a hard "NO?"
If so, that's a huge bummer because I was really entertaining myself with the mental image of you trying to break a wild adult raccoon like a stallion.

Bullet to the head no. It solves a lot of life's nuisance and general training problems.

Either whatever critter it is makes itself accommodating and or useful to me or it proves itself to be enough trouble to justify killing it.

 

or is it entirely possible to have a raccoon without those risk factors,

Not at 'odds' commensurate with sanity! --- IPOF, Randomly sampled, up to 67% of N. American raccoons test positive for the parasite...

Oh. Round worms. Same as what puppies get from fleas?

Please note that B. procyonis infection of paratenic hosts (with corollary larval migrans therein) exhibits greatly enhanced pathogenicity by comparison with that by common 'pet borne' ascarids (e.g. T. canis T. cati, T. leonina, etc...)

@#12 -- this is no joking matter! - Unless, that is, you perceive 'humor' in permanently disabling -often fatal- CNS and other organ/tissue damage?!

VLM: Very Low Morals
NLM: Normally Low Morals
CN: Chronic Nuisance
Baylisascaris Procyonis:

Facetious expansions aside - You seem to be under some misapprehension? Baylisascaris Procyonis denotes the parasite ('macro-pathogen', if you will) under discussion -- Whereas: CN, OLM, NLM, VLM (cerebral nematodiasis, ocular larva migrans, neural larva migrans, visceral larva migrans, respectively) represent complications (strictly speaking, the mechanism of same) of said infection in paratenic hosts including humans... -- Seriously! No laughing matter!

Best regards
HP

 

cooties.

 

You seem to be under some misapprehension?

I'm under quite a lot of misapprehension.
I did that facetious expansion because I want to reveal to you the gravity of my misapprehension!
I have quite enough difficulty with acronyms related to electronics. You throw in a few medical acronyms and I am seriously lost.
Universal Technical Institute = UTI?
In your world, that means, "It hurts when I pee."

I think you suffer from one of my faults, to wit: I tend to think other people know most of what I know. Being mostly self taught, I expect other people can do that. I have been proven wrong many times, but my instinct is still to expect that I am not so special that average people can't understand me. This website exacerbates the illusion because I observe people smarter than I am every day. (I did finally realize that there is no use trying to talk electronics to random people I meet in my day-to-day existence.)
Try as I might, no amount of accidental exposure to medical terminology can even sneak up behind a properly educated physician. I don't know what you know! Not even 10% of it!

To emphasize one point, I was asking if a raccoon can be sanitized, or kept free of wild pathogens from birth, not, "What are the odds a wild raccoon will be safe to snuggle with?" Are raccoons born with several three letter acronyms, or are these acquired diseases?

 

To emphasize one point, I was asking if a raccoon can be sanitized

As a practical matter, no! --While several courses of anthelmintics will 'purge' the adult parasites (as occurrent in 'definitive hosts') it is well-neigh impossible to 'cleanse' said hosts of all 'life stages' of the parasite (hence the advisability of periodic 'worming' of even indoor-only 'conventional pets')...

As a vital 'aside': Please be advised that there is no practically effective treatment for larva migrans (as occurs in 'non-definitive' [Spec. paratenic]) hosts Incl. humans -- That said, while, nonetheless, of grave concern, human infections by larva of ascarid species 'definitively hosted' by 'conventional pets' tend to exhibit significantly better prognoses than do same by B. procyonis...

Disclaimer: @#12 Please accept my apologies for the shamefully over-qualitative (IMO, even pedestrian) 'tone' of the above! -- Such seems to be as per your request? -- If not, please tell me about it!

I did finally realize that there is no use trying to talk electronics to random people I meet in my day-to-day existence.

I wish @Aleph(0) would arrive at that epiphany! -- She appears to be 'in crisis' on that 'front'

Very best regards
HP

PS

Are raccoons born with several three letter acronyms, or are these acquired diseases?

---Emphasis added---

IOW: Will an infected animal necessarily produce infected offspring?

While that's a question better addressed to a veterinarian --- It is, nonetheless, my stance that tolerably 'safe practice' will assume all specimens are infected...

---Edited by @Hypatia's Protege for clarity (28 Mar 2017)---

 

Disclaimer: @#12 Please accept my apologies for the shamefully over-qualitative (IMO, even pedestrian) 'tone' of the above! -- Such seems to be as per your request? -- If not, please tell me about it!

That was exactly the response I needed.
You're just going to have to accept that, medically speaking, I am a pedestrian.
Maybe a bit fancier footed than average, but still a pedestrian.
I have curiosity. I have intellect. I don't have education.
Half of what you say goes right over my head!

As for Aleph? I say to her: The top 20 participants here are obviously in the top 1% of the IQ bell curve. That makes life difficult enough as the general population around me resembles snails in a conversation. Add to that a specialty in a particular scientific field and you might as well shut up and pout if you think you're going to meet your peer in a grocery store. That's difficult enough on a college campus because most of the specialists there aren't in our specialty!

I like to dance with people who can beat me at Scrabble, but I've only met 4 or 5 in a lifetime.
Get used to it. We aren't "average".

 

As for Aleph? I say to her: The top 20 participants here are obviously in the top 1% of the IQ bell curve. That makes life difficult enough as the general population around me resembles snails in a conversation. Add to that a specialty in a particular scientific field and you might as well shut up and pout if you think you're going to meet your peer in a grocery store. That's difficult enough on a college campus because most of the specialists there aren't in our specialty!

I like to dance with people who can beat me at Scrabble, but I've only met 4 or 5 in a lifetime.
Get used to it. We aren't "average".

Yea it's kind of frustrating sometimes. Especially when you meet some suposed expert in a field making big money for what they know and after less than 10 minutes of conversation with them casually picking their brain you find you can run circles around them just on your own personal shits and giggle hobby work you don't think twice about let alone feel is worth anything but your own personal time and just for the fun of it experience.

Even worse when you are dealing with the average ignorant Joe public worker and you can't begin to have a intelligent conversation due to the overwhelming amount of incorrect understandings and misconceptions they have on a subject they work with every day getting in the way.

 

Yea it's kind of frustrating sometimes. Especially when you meet some suposed expert in a field making big money for what they know and after less than 10 minutes of conversation with them casually picking their brain you find you can run circles around them just on your own personal shits and giggle hobby work you don't think twice about let alone feel is worth anything but your own personal time and just for the fun of it experience.

Even worse when you are dealing with the average ignorant Joe public worker and you can't begin to have a intelligent conversation due to the overwhelming amount of incorrect understandings and misconceptions they have on a subject they work with every day getting in the way.

what is the difference between you and expert making big money?

 

new to the thread... but there's an obvious solution that I didn't see posted here:

1. Sensor senses critter
2. MCU reacts and asks "cat or 'coon?"
3. If it hears a "meow", pet it. If it hears a "hiss", taser it

EDIT: my bad... felines can both "meow" and "hiss" ... back to the drawing board...

 

Shoot the cats. Easy.
With all the money you will save on cat food you will be one of those rich experts.

 

Shoot the cats. Easy.
With all the money you will save on cat food you will be one of those rich experts.

good idea... once the cats are gone, all that's left are the 'coons! ... unless you also have a poodle... of course...