Tonight I was working on riveting IT content edits when I heard a strange noise outside - something I hadn't heard before. The cats were out on the porch, but the noise was beyond the porch, somewhere in the yard.
I jumped up and went out to have a look, but I couldn't see anything. It smelled like it could be a skunk, which we've never had in our yard before. I went back inside to get my flashlight.
Light in-hand, I shone it all along the side yard but saw nothing. I went out and explored the front yard, the other side of the house, the back yard, and still saw nothing. I came back inside thinking whatever it was, it had taken off when it heard me walking around.
Back on the front porch, I heard it again, this time off the ground, so I swept the light up toward the neighbor's garage roof and there it was - Mommy Raccoon. Mommy and baby were perched on top of the neighbor's garage, peering into the porch where all three cats had been on display.
The neighbor's garage roof is directly opposite the main side of the porch. A raccoon could probably make the jump and an outside cat could easily leap from the roof to the outside ledge of the porch. I gathered up the cats & moved them inside. They never made a peep and seemed happier to be inside.
I started making what I thought might be scary sounds to run them off - hissing, guttural growling - I sounded really rabid, I thought. They weren't buying it. So I started talking to them, asking Mom what she thought she was doing crawling around rooftops with her baby and such. My boring questions and one-sided conversation quickly motivated them to retreat.
For quite a while Mom explored the area, climbing down from the roof onto a fence while the baby trilled and chattered for her to return. I thought the baby couldn't figure out how to get back down from the roof and Mom might be trying to find a way down for it.
baby on the roof
But every time she returned to the roof, instead of using Mom for leverage and climbing down onto her and then onto the fence, the baby would swipe at Mom, wanting to play instead of get down & move on.
mom on the fence
As I watched Mom climb down the fence to the ground and go around to the neighbor's front yard, I heard another noise coming from the back of the garage. It was another raccoon - another adult. Mom was not happy about this.
I tried to scare off the other adult - it was about to climb up onto the neighbor's roof after the baby and I really wasn't in the mood to watch a tragic nature drama just before going to bed.
When Mom's hissing wasn't shooing The Other away, I grabbed the hose to help out. I shot the hose down the side yard and that ended the standoff. The Other ambled along the top of the fence toward the back yard.
But the baby was still stuck on the roof, so Mom went back up. Wanting them to get down & move on, I went back out to the side yard and propped a long piece of lumber up against the roof, hoping they'd find it and finally get the hell down.
I came inside to the front porch and waited. Mom and baby were now playing on the top of the garage. Baby kept climbing all over Mom, having a great time, and Mom didn't seem at all anxious to find a way down and continue their adventures.
From the porch I could see the other set of shining eyes on the fence coming from the backyard, but I couldn't stay out there with the hose all night. A few minutes later as he got closer, I saw that it wasn't The Other raccoon, it was the neighborhood tomcat, Norman.
This ought to be interesting, I thought, but Norman lives out there and he knows that scene better than I do. I just know that raccoons will go after cats, so I couldn't imagine what Norman thought he was doing out there. I did think, however, that a raccoon *could* solve our problem with Norman constantly trying to fight our cats through the screens...
He slowly and quietly made his way along the fence, then silently crawled up onto the garage roof. I was so busy watching him, I hadn't noticed that in the few seconds it took for him to get onto the roof, the raccoons had taken off. They hadn't made any noise, but they were gone. I guess the baby wasn't stuck after all.
With the raccoons gone, Norman sat at the very top of the garage, as if surveying his domain. I told him I had to admit it, he *is* a badass.
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