ImagiNature Studio

Backyard Visitor... 

On the morning of June 29th, I noticed a visitor to our urban backyard. Raccoons (Procyon lotor) are fairly common around here and our situation—sandwiched between two houses with tall fences (3 kids on one side, 3 dogs on the other) and backing onto a woodlot with a small creek—means we see a lot of them. But it's very rare to see them during the day. Here our inquisitive visitor is checking to see whether its ok to venture out of the woods.

After taking the first few photos, our visitor knew I was there and watched me for more than 15 minutes before tentatively emerging from the edge of the woods.

He finally got up the courage to venture into the yard. I had to draw the line when he decided it would be fun to explore our garbage and organics bins—he tried three times before finally getting the message. Persistent little rascal...