Raccoon!

Winch

Winch

Location
Asheville, NC
I was taking down a big hollow sugar maple yesterday, limb by limb. I looked into a hole on the tree about 25' up, and came face to face with a mommy raccoon.

This is why we stay tied in all the time. I swung around the tree rather quickly and regrouped. Here is the tree at the end of the day.
 

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After I realized the raccoon wasn't coming after me, I proceeded with my work, finally topping the tree about 2' above the nest. By this point the mommy had left and all that was left were these babies.
 

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Same thing happened to me this time of year last year, except in a Silver maple. I saw momma in their with 2 babies and she was content on not being aggressive. We were doing crane work so i set the strap and came down below her nest. We had animal control ready to take the 3 of them into the woods for a new home. While making the cut below her nest she jumped out of the tree, 30' in the air!, at me. She missed by a few feet, bounced off a branch, and landed on the log pile. She shook that off ran back up the tree, climbed into a DIFFERENT hollow and stayed there, refusing to come out for the rest of the job.
 
What I need to know now is what any of you would do at this point. What I hope is that the mother returns to this house with no roof and decides it's time to move her and the babies out. Before Monday, preferably.

I considered calling animal control to see if they could suggest anything, maybe that's my next step. There are few obstacles on the ground, I may drop the rest of the tree all at once, but was really hoping to take a piece or two out first, since the base is really hollow and i'm not sure if I totally trust a hinge.

I really don't want to drop it with the critters in there in any case.

WWYD?
 
That happened to me once a couple of years ago in a large oak. It freaked me out but I wasn't tied in, I was only on a lanyard.

The raccoon freaked me out but what really got me was that there was an animal that big in the tree which meant there was a hollow in the tree that big that I hadn't noticed before my climb.

I wasn't so lucky with the raccoon coming out of the tree. I ended up "chasing" the little guy out onto a lower branch of the tree and we rigged the limb and raccoon out safely.
 
take them home and raise them up! I hear they make can make great pets. If you take them out and set them aside for the mother to come get, she might. I have done that with baby squirrels. It is cool to watch the momma come and haul her babies one by one into an alternative nest they built specifically built in preparation of catastrophic events to their home. I dont know if racoons are the same way. I imagine so.

Whatever the case, I am sure that the momma is thinking real hard about what she should do as well, she wont abandon them if she can help it.
 
I would bet mom has got them all moved by now, if not call the Department of Natural Resources.
As for pets, forget it a buddy had one(found it on the side of the road next to a dead mother and siblings) and when it wasn't raiding the cupboards it was trashing the house,messy,nosey little critters.
 
Call animal control/or other animal resource office. they will come help for free. We set the babies in a have a heart trap, then momma came in that night. The animal officer took all of them 1/2 mile into the woods and freed them.

I had to use the neck choke rod watchamacallit/thingy, to get babies out from nest and down to ground level, before picking the butt. The animal control was afraid they would fall out and behurt as we laid the butt down. They never made a peep! Cool little guys.
 
yeah, the pets thing was a joke really that would be a full on commitment. lots of time and love which is Pretty precious stuff,how much of it can one give to a coon, much less 3!
 
Not a good pet. Did you hear about the pet racoon that tried to eat a couple's human baby at night. I guess it ate part of the baby's face off.

On the other side, I migh sound cruel or inhumane, but I am not bothered much if a racoon dies . The other weed I dropped a tree and was starting to cut it up when sll the sudden fur started flying out the top side of my saw bar. Darn thing was holed up and wasn't moving until....it got cut and I stopped what I was doing. I didn't have to cut the tree up so I left it alone. I guess it probaly crawled out the rest of the way as I did see it looking out the hole at me after the fact.

I do have a couple other stories if anyone wants to hear...

PS-- I am not an animal hater, but racoons do carry diseases and they can be quite aggressive so I would rather recycle them than relocate them if I have to get involved with them.
 
Yeah it is a matter oa time till we all have some wild critter dealing up there in them trees. I have dealt with a couple of holed up critters, best just leave them be tell home owner and check in the next day, OOO and don't touch them the mamma may just leave them.
Was helping out a buddy taking some trees down near his field(shooting lane for hunting).Couldn't drop the trees do to the corn, stepped away to take care of morning coffee spooked some turkey(bout peed right there) watched them fly up and roost in same tree I was taking down. We sat in the truck for about 30 mins until they came down and moved on.
 
In Virginia i was taking down a tree and cut over a flying squrrells nest in a cavity. 5 of them jumped on the edge and sailed off! Another time i was stumping a tree and sawed a skunk in two PHEW! Saw stank for weeks!
 
This winter I was climbing up a water oak, looked in a hollow about 30' up and spotted a big ball of fur that was breathing. Scared me real good, but I finally decided it wasn't going to do anything about me. I cut the top off the tree with the chain saw running like a foot above the animal's head but it still didn't wake up. It finally came to life when I dropped the 30' stub and I don't think a raccon's ever has such a rude awakening...he would have been happy to sleep another two months, I think!!!

He ended up OK, just ran off into the woods. He was so fat that I wasn't too sorry for him. He must live off the garbage in the neighborhood or something.
 
Just did a maple last week that was just a drop, but when it hit the ground it split open and bats started screaming outta there. Must have been a couple hundred, don't know what I would have done if I was up there cutting through when they came out? Tree was too far gone to climb anyways. Only found 3 dead ones when they were finnaly all gone.
 
This spring i was cleaning out an ash and cut a gray squirrel in half. The next week i dropped a Norway Maple that had a crack in it. When i hit the ground it popped open and a coons leg feel out and got crushed. We ended up shooting the poor feller.

The coon's leg is in the middle of the pic. I have pics of the squirrel's bloody mess too but didn't think anyone would care to see them.
 

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I was climbing up a maple on the weekend and grabbed the edge of a hollow to reposition myself. Peered in the hollow and saw the backside of a raccoon. Climbed above to hook up the ling to the crane then came down and cut below the nest. That raccoon had a ride over the house. He took off while we were bucking the rest. No one the worse for wear.
 
I had one sorta like Althor's, but happier ending. Cut a big old dead maple (told the owner beforehand he should think about leaving it as a wildlife tree) and as we were sawing and chipping it up I saw a coon in a hollow. We shut down the machines, determined his leg was caught in a trunk crack, tweaked the trunk with the tractor to open the crack, Mr Coon pulled his leg out and waddled away. He was a fat one, looked like he was wearing a giant coon skin coat like he was the Big Man On Campus.
 
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