Can You Outsmart a Raccoon?
On a quiet evening in Laramie, Wyoming, what looks like a lone file cabinet sits near an abandoned barn. As the sun dips below the horizon, a commotion begins. Soon, there are paws scratching and teeth gnashing against aluminum and wood as fuzzy butts bump each other out of the way.
Like desperate high school freshmen who’ve forgotten their locker codes, raccoons jostle and fiddle with various locks guarding cubbies full of delicious dog food and sardine treats. Other raccoons wait in the background, ready to pounce on any unattended scraps. A skunk wandering into the ruckus gets shoved aside by the masked bandits.
This adorable anecdote was part of a research project detailed in July in Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences and one of several recent examples of our changing understanding of raccoon intelligence. While many other species around the world are in decline, raccoons are actually thriving, and do particularly well in urban areas, says lead author Lauren Stanton, a cognitive ecologist at the University of California, Berkeley. A large part of their success is due to their adaptability to new challenges and opportunities, whether that’s nesting in cozy chimneys, invading chicken coops, or breaking into trash bins—something that’s earned them the nickname “trash pandas.”
Raccoons are strong—they can push a cinder block off a trash can—and tenacious. The more we do to keep them out, the more skills they learn for breaking in, leading to a cognitive arms race between people and raccoons.
