Our Recent Guest: a Racoon

We awoke one morning with some insulation on the kitchen floor (it had fallen through a hole for a reccessed light that isn't installed yet). That was our first clue that something had inhabited our attic space. Later than evening, more insulation had fallen through. Mike finally decided he would have to go up there to investigate, armed with goggles, gloves, and a tennis racquet. As he climbed up, Ginger noticed a tail and some nose and eyes poking down through a hole in the soffit over the deck. This racoon decided to climb up into our attic space through a small opening in the soffit created by the deck job. The plastic covering the hole was ripped off in a storm a couple weeks ago, and the racoon found it before we covered the hole back up. We think the racoon spent a day sleeping up there. Mike was able to scare it down and this picture shows it climbing down the side of the house to escape. It was bigger than a cat. It created some entertainment on an otherwise dull evening. Needless to say, Mike nailed some screen over the opening and we had our siding guy come and fix the hole the next week.