Can Raccoons Be Domesticated? (We Already Tried)

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• AL

  @AlmostTamed · 7 days ago

  Sources (every number in the script, grouped by topic)<br><br>The fur farms<br>- Jones, Fur-Farming in Canada, Commission of Conservation, Ottawa, 1914: &quot;when captured as a cub, is easily tamed&quot;: <a href="https://archive.org/details/furfarmingincana00joneuoft">https://archive.org/details/furfarmingincana00joneuoft</a><br>- American Breeders&apos; Association report, reprinted in Jones 1914, pp. 125-126: &quot;Cheaper kinds of fur, such as skunk, muskrat, raccoon and opossum, may under special conditions yield paying returns, but need not be considered at present.&quot;: <a href="https://archive.org/details/furfarmingincana00joneuoft">https://archive.org/details/furfarmingincana00joneuoft</a><br>- Same report: &quot;there seems to have been no systematic attempt to develop a domestic breed of fur-bearing animals.&quot;: <a href="https://archive.org/details/furfarmingincana00joneuoft">https://archive.org/details/furfarmingincana00joneuoft</a><br>- Alaska Department of Fish and Game, Sounds Wild, &quot;Fur Farm&quot;: &quot;by 1929 there were more than 700 fur farms in the Alaska territory&quot;: <a href="https://www.adfg.alaska.gov/index.cfm?adfg=soundswild.episode&amp;id=fur-farm">https://www.adfg.alaska.gov/index.cfm?adfg=soundswild.episode&amp;id=fur-farm</a><br>- Iowa DNR furbearer report 2023-24, Table 3.4 (raccoon, mean price per pelt): 29.97 in 1979-80, 5.06 in 2023-24 (nominal dollars): <a href="https://iowadnr.gov/media/1736/download?inline=1">https://iowadnr.gov/media/1736/download?inline=1</a><br><br>Germany, 1934<br>- LAGIS Hessen, Zeitgeschichte in Hessen: &quot;In der Revierforsterei Asel am Edersee, Abt. 187, werden zwei Paare von (nordamerikanischen) Waschbaeren ausgewildert&quot; (12 April 1934); the permit from Berlin is dated 28 April 1934: <a href="https://www.lagis-hessen.de/de/subjects/idrec/sn/edbx/id/3204">https://www.lagis-hessen.de/de/subjects/idrec/sn/edbx/id/3204</a><br>- Landesjagdverband Hessen: the release was &quot;zur Bereicherung der natuerlichen Fauna&quot;, and experts advised against it: <a href="https://ljv-hessen.de/der-waschbaer-in-hessen/">https://ljv-hessen.de/der-waschbaer-in-hessen/</a><br>- Goethe-Universitaet Frankfurt, ZOWIAC position paper, July 2025: &quot;1,6 bis 2 Millionen Tieren in Deutschland&quot;; &quot;In Staedten wie Kassel leben mittlerweile ueber 100 Waschbaeren pro 100 Hektar&quot;: <a href="https://aktuelles.uni-frankfurt.de/en/forschung/niedlich-aber-nicht-unproblematisch-positionspapier-raeumt-mit-mythen-rund-um-die-invasiven-waschbaeren-auf/">https://aktuelles.uni-frankfurt.de/en/forschung/niedlich-aber-nicht-unproblematisch-positionspapier-raeumt-mit-mythen-rund-um-die-invasiven-waschbaeren-auf/</a><br><br>The Soviet releases<br>- Heptner &amp; Sludskii, Mammals of the Soviet Union II(1b), English translation, p. 1381: &quot;The total number of attempts (up to 1962) was 26 releases, for a total 1222 individuals. Of these, 64 were from the farms and zoos&quot;: <a href="https://archive.org/details/mammalsofsov212001gept">https://archive.org/details/mammalsofsov212001gept</a><br>- Same, p. 1384: the first release, 22 raccoons by the Uzbek Zoo in the Kirghiz SSR in 1936: <a href="https://archive.org/details/mammalsofsov212001gept">https://archive.org/details/mammalsofsov212001gept</a><br>- Same, pp. 1391-1392: &quot;the practical significance of raccoon as a fur-bearing animal cannot be great&quot;: <a href="https://archive.org/details/mammalsofsov212001gept">https://archive.org/details/mammalsofsov212001gept</a><br>- Nauka v Sibiri (Siberian Branch, Russian Academy of Sciences), answered by researchers at the Institute of Cytology and Genetics: tamed animals &quot;prosto soglasilis terpet lyudey&quot;; the Belyaev domestication experiment covered the silver fox, the American mink and the grey rat: <a href="https://www.sbras.info/public-reception/question/kakikh-esche-zhivotnykh-mozhet-priruchit-chelovek">https://www.sbras.info/public-reception/question/kakikh-esche-zhivotnykh-mozhet-priruchit-chelovek</a><br><br>The White House raccoon<br>- <a href="http://history.com/">History.com</a>, C. Klein, on Rebecca: a collar &quot;engraved with the words &apos;Rebecca Raccoon of the White House&apos;&quot;; the $500 raccoon coat; &quot;regular Houdini&quot;; the bandaged wrist: <a href="https://www.history.com/articles/the-thanksgiving-raccoon-that-became-a-presidential-pet">https://www.history.com/articles/the-thanksgiving-raccoon-that-became-a-presidential-pet</a><br>- Smithsonian Magazine, J. Daley, 27 Nov 2019: &quot;In November 1926, Vinnie Joyce of Nitta Yuma, Mississippi, sent President Calvin Coolidge an unsolicited plump raccoon for his Thanksgiving dinner.&quot;: <a href="https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/raccoon-was-once-thanksgiving-feast-fit-president-180973665/">https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/raccoon-was-once-thanksgiving-feast-fit-president-180973665/</a><br><br>Japan<br>- Ministry of the Environment, Guide to raccoon control, 2025, p. 2: a raccoon cartoon aired nationwide in the late 1970s and raccoons were imported in large numbers as pets; &quot;many individuals become rough as they grow up&quot;, so they were abandoned or escaped: <a href="https://www.env.go.jp/nature/intro/3control/files/araiguma_tebiki_kansei.pdf">https://www.env.go.jp/nature/intro/3control/files/araiguma_tebiki_kansei.pdf</a><br>- Same: 9 raccoons caught nationwide in fiscal 1991, more than 96,000 in 2020; now establishing in every prefecture except Okinawa: <a href="https://www.env.go.jp/nature/intro/3control/files/araiguma_tebiki_kansei.pdf">https://www.env.go.jp/nature/intro/3control/files/araiguma_tebiki_kansei.pdf</a><br>- M. Kawamichi, Kansai Wildlife Research Institute, 2014: tens of thousands of raccoons were imported during the Araiguma Rascal boom, mainly as pets: <a href="http://www.kansaiwildlife.com/pdf/racoon20140124-27/rs2014_04.pdf">http://www.kansaiwildlife.com/pdf/racoon20140124-27/rs2014_04.pdf</a><br>- Ministry of the Environment, Invasive Alien Species Act Q&amp;A: keeping a designated species is limited to research, exhibition and education, and a new permit to keep one as a pet cannot be granted; if you can no longer keep it, you must put it down yourself: <a href="https://www.env.go.jp/nature/intro/1law/qa.html">https://www.env.go.jp/nature/intro/1law/qa.html</a><br><br>Intelligence and social life<br>- H. B. Davis, &quot;The Raccoon: A Study in Animal Intelligence&quot;, American Journal of Psychology 18(4), 1907: thirteen locking devices, forty trials each; &quot;a nearly equal facility in learning to undo fastenings&quot; compared with monkeys; the skill &quot;remains practically undiminished for periods of no practice of more than a year&quot;: <a href="https://archive.org/details/jstor-1412576">https://archive.org/details/jstor-1412576</a><br>- Hirsch et al., PLOS ONE, 2013: adult male raccoons &quot;often form social groups&quot;, commonly 2-4 sharing a home range; females are less social: <a href="https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0075830">https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0075830</a><br>- CNN, 24 Nov 2025, quoting zooarchaeologist Grossman: &quot;Animals that have been domesticated have a very specific social structure, and raccoons are not one of those animals.&quot;: <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2025/11/24/science/raccoons-urban-trash-domestication-shorter-snouts">https://www.cnn.com/2025/11/24/science/raccoons-urban-trash-domestication-shorter-snouts</a><br><br>Rabies and roundworm<br>- NASPHV, Compendium of Animal Rabies Prevention and Control, 2016: &quot;No parenteral rabies vaccines are licensed for use in wild animals or wild animal hybrids.&quot;; the 10-day observation rule applies to dogs, cats and ferrets only: <a href="https://health.ny.gov/diseases/communicable/zoonoses/rabies/docs/2016_compendium.pdf">https://health.ny.gov/diseases/communicable/zoonoses/rabies/docs/2016_compendium.pdf</a><br>- Haley et al., Tropical Medicine and Infectious Disease 2(3), 2017: &quot;raccoon rabies is primarily perpetuated within the raccoon&quot;: <a href="https://doi.org/10.3390/tropicalmed2030041">https://doi.org/10.3390/tropicalmed2030041</a><br>- Slate et al., PLoS Neglected Tropical Diseases, 2009: &quot;Purposeful human-assisted translocations of raccoons to portions of western Virginia and southern West Virginia documented in the 1970s resulted in the creation of a new Mid-Atlantic raccoon rabies epizootic focus&quot;: <a href="https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pntd.0000549">https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pntd.0000549</a><br>- Weese &amp; Stull, Canadian Veterinary Journal 66(7), 2025: 60 human Baylisascaris infections, median age 2.9 years, 78% with neurological disease; of 42 with reported outcomes, 8 died and 4 fully recovered: <a href="https://europepmc.org/article/PMC/PMC12261942">https://europepmc.org/article/PMC/PMC12261942</a><br><br>The law<br>- Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2016/1141 of 13 July 2016: the first Union list of invasive alien species includes Procyon lotor: <a href="https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/HTML/?uri=CELEX:32016R1141">https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/HTML/?uri=CELEX:32016R1141</a><br>- Regulation (EU) No 1143/2014, Article 7(1): listed species shall not be kept, bred, transported, placed on the market, used or exchanged, permitted to reproduce, or released: <a href="https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/HTML/?uri=CELEX:32014R1143">https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/HTML/?uri=CELEX:32014R1143</a><br>- California Code of Regulations, title 14, section 671: the family Procyonidae is listed, and listed species are termed &quot;detrimental animals&quot;: <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/regulations/california/14-CCR-671">https://www.law.cornell.edu/regulations/california/14-CCR-671</a><br>- Arkansas Game and Fish Commission, Captive Wildlife: &quot;Up to six individual animals from the following list and taken by hand from the wild may be kept per household: Opossums, rabbits, raccoons or squirrels.&quot;: <a href="https://www.agfc.com/education/captive-wildlife/">https://www.agfc.com/education/captive-wildlife/</a><br><br>The two 2025 studies<br>- Apostolov et al. (Lesch lab), Frontiers in Zoology, 2025: &quot;Overall, we observed a 3.56% snout reduction between rural to urban raccoons&quot;; 249 measurable photographs (38 rural); &quot;early-stage domestication symptoms&quot; in a &quot;yet non-domesticated&quot; species: <a href="https://doi.org/10.1186/s12983-025-00583-1">https://doi.org/10.1186/s12983-025-00583-1</a>