AI Can’t Fix My Broken Raccoon Trap
Protecting my chickens against the nighttime marauders
For most of July, the smell of death wafted through our yard. We have an adorable red chicken coop with white shutters and for the last decade, I’ve kept a motley crew of about a dozen chickens safe and happy in it.
This summer, a neighborhood raccoon discovered my chicken coop and ran rampant through the flock. In children’s books and movies, raccoons look cute, but in reality, they are nighttime marauders who behead chickens for fun, scatter feathers like confetti and splatter blood like paint.
First, Big Momma disappeared overnight. The next night, two soft brown hens were taken from the coop, dismembered, and left on the lawn. Five more chickens were snatched despite our best efforts to keep the coop sealed up tight.
I bought a trap at the feed store for $54. It is a wire cage that has a trip plate inside. The goal is to lure an animal into it with bait so that they step on the trip plate and can’t escape.
The first night I set it, I spread peanut butter on a Ritz cracker and topped it off with a spoonful of raw, grass-fed ground beef. Who could resist? I put it in the trap and went to sleep.
In the morning — nothing.
