Dang racoon in broad daylight

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  • Clovis

    Ultimate Member
    MDS Supporter
    Aug 1, 2011
    1,408
    Centreville
    Just finished bringing in fire wood for the night and sat down at the PC for a few minutes and the dog started barking out the back door like she had just seen Satan. I look and there is a racoon walking across the yard. Daytime racoon is not good news so I grab a rifle and head out. Its gotten almost across the yard and I have to work around the goat enclosure to get a clear shot and the thing turns and runs into the goat pen and starts chasing a goat around. Still no clear shot then runs to the other end of the pen where fencing is got smaller holes and it can't get out so it started heading back where it came from and I finally get a shot and it is down. One shot to the chest area with a 17machII and second to just be sure. Now the health department has it. Glad it went after the other old goat and not me.
     

    CombatAK

    Hooligan #12
    Sep 1, 2015
    1,156
    Cresaptown
    Just finished bringing in fire wood for the night and sat down at the PC for a few minutes and the dog started barking out the back door like she had just seen Satan. I look and there is a racoon walking across the yard. Daytime racoon is not good news so I grab a rifle and head out.

    Apparently, he didn't set his clock forward. :lol2: Anyway, will the health department update you? Since you have goats, I would think that if it had rabies, they would want you to know.
     

    Clovis

    Ultimate Member
    MDS Supporter
    Aug 1, 2011
    1,408
    Centreville
    Health department said they would let us know. Goats are up to date on rabies shots. I guess he could have been particularly upset by the recent time change.
     

    DaveP

    Active Member
    Jan 27, 2013
    630
    St. Marys county
    Had a skunk walk across an open field and into barn a couple years ago. Labor Day, near 90F. Got in with goats, I popped it thru lungs with CB cap, double bagged and iced it.

    Health Dept. person on call didnt want to come out cause it was Labor Day. FINALLY came out and got it. Test came back positive.

    Quarantined everything, kids / animals missed county fairs, etc.

    Funny thing, they were WAY more concerned with animals than me!

    Took months to get my titer checked.( I had shots 25 years earlier) . Titer still good.

    Killed a few more soon after that I'm sure had rabies, one paralytic. Bleach and a deep hole.

    Coons around here had distemper a few years back, some symptoms are similar.
     

    PapiBarcelona

    Ultimate Member
    Jan 1, 2011
    7,343
    Just be glad you didn't get bitten/exposed. I had to do the post exposure rabies a few years ago, I think it was like 7 shots spread out over like 2 weeks time.

    Up here in Harford you have to go to the ER to start it, then they send you to another hospital that has some kind of daytime primary care area to complete the process.
     

    Clovis

    Ultimate Member
    MDS Supporter
    Aug 1, 2011
    1,408
    Centreville
    Just be glad you didn't get bitten/exposed. I had to do the post exposure rabies a few years ago, I think it was like 7 shots spread out over like 2 weeks time.

    Up here in Harford you have to go to the ER to start it, then they send you to another hospital that has some kind of daytime primary care area to complete the process.

    Figured it was likely rabid, that's why I went after it to begin with, it only went after the goat after I was out trying to get a shot at it. Posted here with the intent to warn folks of the problem of rabies in the area and hope no one else has a problem.
    Oh, and I considered distemper as well but I have not experienced something with this much aggression around here in the past. Was going to just bury it but thought the county ought to know the problem and add to the stats.
     

    fidelity

    piled higher and deeper
    MDS Supporter
    Aug 15, 2012
    22,400
    Frederick County
    Glad you posted. I had heard from folks that I know at Frederick Memorial Hospital that they were seeing a lot of cases of possible exposures in late summer and fall of 2017. This is anecdotal information of course, but it's good to be aware, and your post is a useful heads up reminder to folks to be wary of unusual behavior by raccoons, skunks, foxes, etc.

    Sent from my Pixel XL using Tapatalk
     

    Aventus

    Banned
    BANNED!!!
    Sep 5, 2016
    778
    My security cameras caught these raccoons around noon just last week.

    uPmbsjLh.jpg
     

    zoostation

    , ,
    Moderator
    Jan 28, 2007
    22,857
    Abingdon
    Just be glad you didn't get bitten/exposed. I had to do the post exposure rabies a few years ago, I think it was like 7 shots spread out over like 2 weeks time.

    Up here in Harford you have to go to the ER to start it, then they send you to another hospital that has some kind of daytime primary care area to complete the process.

    Initially it's one shot of vaccine and four shots of human rabies immunoglobulin in the ER for people who have never been vaccinated before. The immunoglobulin is essentially ready-made antibodies to give you protection for the week or so it takes for your body to start making enough of it's own. It's the more expensive of the two by far and lack of it is why people in the Third World who can't get it sometimes die even though they start the vaccine (only) shots on time. Lack of it is also why it's a good idea to get a rabies vaccination before traveling to Third World countries.

    Then it's follow up vaccine shots, one each on days 3, 7, and 14 at Harford Memorial now. They want it done at a hospital because apparently some people can have an allergic reaction to the vaccine. While IMHO the four globulin shots in the legs weren't pleasant it beats the hell out of the 16 needles in the stomach people got when I was a kid.
     

    zoostation

    , ,
    Moderator
    Jan 28, 2007
    22,857
    Abingdon
    Health department said they would let us know. Goats are up to date on rabies shots. I guess he could have been particularly upset by the recent time change.

    If he possibly bit a goat the goat may need a precautionary rabies booster. They do that with horses anyway. I would check w/ your vet.
     

    BigDaddy

    Ultimate Member
    Feb 7, 2014
    2,235
    There was a guy in my freshman class in college who was paralyzed from rabies vaccine. That was way back in 1969, maybe the risk changed, or maybe it was Guillian Barre, which was also associated with the swine flu vaccine.

    I saw a film from WW2, US doctors came to a town somewhere in No. Africa where 5 guys just got bitten by a rabid dog. They were standing around with bandages on their arms or legs. Then they filmed them as they were dying of rabies a couple weeks later. You don't want to die of rabies.
     

    zoostation

    , ,
    Moderator
    Jan 28, 2007
    22,857
    Abingdon
    There was a guy in my freshman class in college who was paralyzed from rabies vaccine. That was way back in 1969, maybe the risk changed, or maybe it was Guillian Barre, which was also associated with the swine flu vaccine.

    I saw a film from WW2, US doctors came to a town somewhere in No. Africa where 5 guys just got bitten by a rabid dog. They were standing around with bandages on their arms or legs. Then they filmed them as they were dying of rabies a couple weeks later. You don't want to die of rabies.

    I think the vaccines they use now are different. Back then they were still doing the shots in the stomach and (I think) still using exposed animal tissue to make it. The ones now are just 4 shots in the arm and made from human diploid cells. I don't know what a diploid cell is, but I feel smart when I say it.
     

    fidelity

    piled higher and deeper
    MDS Supporter
    Aug 15, 2012
    22,400
    Frederick County
    I think the vaccines they use now are different. Back then they were still doing the shots in the stomach and (I think) still using exposed animal tissue to make it. The ones now are just 4 shots in the arm and made from human diploid cells. I don't know what a diploid cell is, but I feel smart when I say it.

    Lol, well not haploid cells (which have only a single set of chromosomes) that are gametes which give rise to sperm and egg cells. And not aneuploid cells which are typically cancerous and have messed up chromosome numbers. Diploid cells contain two copies of the chromosome complement. In this case, they're actually primary human cells that were first cultured more than 50 years ago.

    Sent from my Pixel XL using Tapatalk
     

    Baccusboy

    Teecha, teecha
    Oct 10, 2010
    13,881
    Seoul
    Geesh, you guys scared me into realizing something.

    Had my Korean family visiting Iowa last summer. My wife was watching my daughter play in the back yard (parents live at the North end of town). Apparently, some animal that didn't look like a dog entered the yard, and my Korean wife -- who has no understanding of wildlife in the Iowa area -- told my equally uninformed daughter to come inside. She had no idea what that animal was, but she said, "It didn't look right." When she said that, I took it to mean that she meant it didn't look like a dog. I didn't even think about rabies. Based on what you're saying above.... if an animal such as this is in daylight, then it's an indicator that they're sick? Thanks for that.

    Later that week, we went to the zoo, and my wife and daughter got all excited at seeing foxes, because that's what they saw in the back yard, that afternoon.

    At the time, I explained to my wife that animals (meaning the potentially bad neighborhood dog) are one reason why I carry a gun. After that, she wasn't bothered by my CCW on our South Dakota trip.

    We have since had some discussions about foxes, mountain lions (some pretty big ones have come back to the state), raccoons, and bobcats. All common in Iowa.
     

    Clovis

    Ultimate Member
    MDS Supporter
    Aug 1, 2011
    1,408
    Centreville
    If he possibly bit a goat the goat may need a precautionary rabies booster. They do that with horses anyway. I would check w/ your vet.

    I didn't see a bite occur, but things were moving pretty rapidly at that point. The goats are the wife's and daughter's and the wife called the vet when this happened. I'll ask to double check on boosters. There were no obvious wounds or bleeding (well, except for the racoon).
     

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