Last September 1997, I took my scout troop to camp at a remote area of one of our council camps and got camp set up. After lights out at 11 pm and camp was quiet, I heard the mother of one of the boys that was camping with us screaming and yelling. I got out of my tent to find out what was going on just to find the mom yelling at a racoon eating a candy bar that she left out in a grocery bag.

The next morning, I got up to start a fire and start the cooking for the adults of the troop. I went over to my station wagon to get the breakfast food out to cook and saw two eaten bananas, and a whole package of sweetrolls for Sunday morning eaten. I was ready to go question the boys, when I noticed one of the back windows that was left half way down, so I looked in the back seat where I saw a 35-40 pound racoon. I opened the back door and front door and I tried to get the coon out, but it wouldn't budge. I went and got the camp shovel and opened the other back door and had to "shovel" the racoon out of the car. The boys got a good laugh about this.

I thought this would be the end of the racoons on this weekend. I was wrong. That evenng, I was cooking a cassorole and a cobbler. When they were done, I pulled them off the coals to let cool, when I noticed the big racoon strutting up to the fire and it had the nerve to bring two of it buddies(smaller racoons) with him. The two smaller racoons stayed by the wood pile while the larger coon came up and sniffed the two dutch ovens. The racoon decided it liked the smell of the oven with the cobbler it it, so it tried to push the lid off the oven. It wound up burning its paws and limped over to the tree line, but the two smaller coons crept up and we, the leaders tossed crumbs to the smller racoons. When they had their fill, the racoons didn't bother us for the rest of the weekend.

Brian Watkins ASM T497

While the adults were frying the fish, one patrol noticed that several racoons were getting rather brave about coming out of the bushes near their campsite cooking area. The racoons quickly retreated when the rather noisy 11 year olds started hollering about their presence.

While we ate and did clean up we noticed several of them scamper between bushes around the campsite, but none were brave enough to come into camp. Before bed we made sure that all food items were in ice chests or food boxes and well weighted down before turning in for the night. We had even slid the adult's non perishable food box under the troop trailer so it couldn't be opened.

The adults were about asleep when all the noise started. The guys closest to the troop trailer shined their light out of the tent and hollered that the racoons were raiding the camp. The other female ASM and I were getting out of our tents by the time the SM said something about getting dressed.

We got about 2 foot from the racoon while yelling at it before it decided to back away some. We then started throwing rocks toward him, while the racoon stood there watching them land all around him. Mrs Mac continued to throw while I opened the trailer and started stuffing gear into it. About the time I finished, Mrs Mac got her aim and got a bounced hit to the racoon who decided to leave. All this time the 6 men were laughing about they knew they brought us along for some reason that the females good for defending the camp.

One lesson we learned - a racoon can get an wnopened bag of chips out of the handhole on the side of a tote tray that is weighted down. Also, never expect the guys to get out of their tents in the middle of the night, especially to chase off the racoons!

YIS - Ginger Jenner