Raccoon Mother's Day: Appreciating a Maternal Bond

Humane Wildlife Services was contacted to investigate wildlife activity that was occurring behind a wall in the chapel area of a church located in Washington, D.C. The clients suspected there were raccoons denning in their chimney flue, but unfortunately the fireplace had been closed off behind the wall during renovations. We had to first cut a small hole in the drywall and use a camera to view the fireplace behind the wall. The camera showed three young raccoons between the wall and the glass of the fireplace. We cut a larger hole so we could reach in and retrieve the babies. The vocalizations from the young brought an interested mom down from the flue. We put the babies in a reunion box to be reunited with their mother on the outside of the church. Since mom was still in the chimney we installed a one-way door at the top so she could exit when she was ready. (Once she exits the one-way door she will not be able to get back inside the chimney). Next, we located the path that the mother raccoon was using to get up and down the roof and placed the reunion box along the path where she would encounter it. Later that night two of the baby raccoons boldly emerged from the reunion box seemingly anxious for mom to come and get them. When the mother raccoon exited the chimney she quickly located all three of her babies and led them to one of her other known den sites in the area. The next day we returned to retrieve the empty reunion box and install a chimney cap on the open flue. The clients were happy to have the baby raccoons humanely removed from the chimney and reunited with their mother. They were also very happy to have all of their chimneys capped to prevent this from happening again in the future!