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Raccoons are showing early signs of domestication

scientificamerican.com

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Re: Raccoons are showing early signs of domestication

#181

Post by underlipton »

IAmBroom wrote: post #166
underlipton wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Does the scent gland do anything more than just stinking? It's part of their communication system. There's no direct corollary in human qualia, but you might say it's akin to permanently destroying your ability to flirt or tell other people that something belongs to you. You would still experience the impulse, but not have the cognitive equipment to do so any longer. Removing scent glands destroys the physiological…

That's a wildly stretched metaphor. Spraying a threat with a chemical weapon so powerful it will deter a hungry predator is not akin to winking at a cute girl or boy. And if the scent gland is "part of their communication system", then a loaded 45 is part of a (domesticated, modern) human's.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anal_gland

Skunks use their anal scent glands as a defensive weapon, yes, and it's thought that this is their primary use. However, until recently, it was also thought that skunks didn't scent mark at all. It turns out that they do, through body-rubbing, like cats. It stands to reason then that we might also be wrong about the functions of their anal glands, and that (as with most carnivores) they serve some sort of less-extreme communication function in addition to the last-resort defense. But threat displays are also part of a human's communication system, yes.

In any case, there are differing accounts as to whether removal affects the animal, and also whether it's even necessary to prevent spray incidents.

https://publish.illinois.edu/maxallen/files/2021/04/Jackson-...

https://www.reddit.com/r/Skunks/comments/fyxdsk/hello_i_have...

Re: Raccoons are showing early signs of domestication

#182

Post by throwaway290 »

devin wrote: post #162
LandR wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is it not? I'm currently 1 of 3 injections into getting a rabies vaccine and it's basically like every other vaccine I've had. A simple, painless, injection in the arm. I got it the same time as my first shot of the Hep B vaccine too.

This style of rabies vaccine is for pre-exposure. Post-exposure vaccination is more involved if you aren’t primed. In addition, it used to be the case that people received abdominal shots and the course was pretty intense. That has ended, but people remember it.

post exposure vaccination is a thing?? does it work for everything and why is it called vaccination not treatment?

Re: Raccoons are showing early signs of domestication

#183

Post by sqircles »

nunez wrote: post #59

People have been trying to make the house raccoon a thing: https://old.reddit.com/r/raccoons From what I remember spending time on this topic, raccoons need super challenging locks as toys and TONS of engagement from their keepers because they get bored easily and bored raccoons == ultra destructive raccoons. Also, rabies.

Just make sure you know your state's laws and regulations very well. I had a friend in a mid-western state that was caring for a couple of babies when a tree fell and killed their mother. They were in contact with a licensed rescue to get them to them. The Dept. of Conservation caught wind and showed up at their house, took the animals, walked into their back yard with them and shot them on the spot.

Re: Raccoons are showing early signs of domestication

#184

Post by shaftway »

barbazoo wrote: post #175
BeFlatXIII wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why promote such a loser and defeatist attitude?

Because “having” things isn’t the goal for most of us.

"Having" things is the goal of most humans on this planet. Some individuals can control those baser instincts, but most people can not.

Re: Raccoons are showing early signs of domestication

#185

Post by scotty79 »

IAmBroom wrote: post #163
scotty79 wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cats aren't really domesticated. Out of many, many cat species we just found one that's well aligned with humans and it spread with humans to the whole world. No other cat species plays well with humans and none shows any signs of domestication.

Citation required for claim that runs counter to most scientific evidence.

Sure thing. That one specific cat species was (and still is) Felis silvestris lybica. All domestic cats come from it and it's still the friendliest towards humans, out of all cat species. They still can and commonly bread with each other when they live in the same area.

Some light reading: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-institution/ask-s...

So, what was your evidence again?

Re: Raccoons are showing early signs of domestication

#186

Post by mr_toad »

gwd wrote: post #125
caymanjim wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're pretty great pets. We had one for a while when I was a kid. Its mom got run over and we nursed it and raised it for a few months. Instinctively used the same litter box as the cats. Hung out on the couch sitting on my shoulder watching TV. Friendly and playful. Would follow people around and play with toys. The biggest challenge is that they basically have hands. He would climb up the kitchen cabinets, grab a…

I remember reading somewhere once that baby raccoons are actually quite cuddly and tame; but that when they go adolescence, they have a hormone shift that makes them aggressive enough to be unsuitable as a pet. In the story a woman who had raised a baby raccoon was attacked by it after it grew to a certain age.

One of the hallmarks of domestication is retaining pre-adolescent behaviour in adulthood, for example dogs barking.

Re: Raccoons are showing early signs of domestication

#187

Post by mr_toad »

scotty79 wrote: post #185
IAmBroom wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Citation required for claim that runs counter to most scientific evidence.

Sure thing. That one specific cat species was (and still is) Felis silvestris lybica. All domestic cats come from it and it's still the friendliest towards humans, out of all cat species. They still can and commonly bread with each other when they live in the same area. Some light reading: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-institution/ask-s... So, what was your evidence again?

Dogs are genetically the same species: Canis familiaris, a type of grey wolf. They can breed with wolves, and other closely related canines.

Re: Raccoons are showing early signs of domestication

#188

Post by wil421 »

throwaway290 wrote: post #182
devin wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This style of rabies vaccine is for pre-exposure. Post-exposure vaccination is more involved if you aren’t primed. In addition, it used to be the case that people received abdominal shots and the course was pretty intense. That has ended, but people remember it.

post exposure vaccination is a thing?? does it work for everything and why is it called vaccination not treatment?

Yes, you can get the vaccine but you only have days/weeks to do it.

Re: Raccoons are showing early signs of domestication

#189

Post by brewtide »

chasing0entropy wrote: post #139

Racoons, even city's racoons are terrible beasts. Sure, they are friendly when they aren't upset; Take a treat away from the hands of the sweetest racoon and it will either pounce on you to retrieve it, scream bloody murder, or pounce and slash at you until you retreat. Racoons, especially in the city, will kill and eat an older housecat or easy to access domestic chickens without hesitation. Declawing them helps, bu…

I have a bunch of racoons in my yard every night. A year ago, on some whim, they decided to rip open the less than secure but 8 ft in the air vent grating for the chicken coop.

Some chickens made it, most in fact. But playtime involved ripping the heads off 3 of them.

They can be quite sinister.

Re: Raccoons are showing early signs of domestication

#190

Post by mr_toad »

superultra wrote: post #114
foo-bar-bat wrote: post #12

Raccoons have been living literally inside of houses for centuries. One was kept as a pet in Jamestown Virginia in the 1600s. Another lived in the White House in the 1900s. Surely, not a decade has passed between have there been NO domesticated raccoons in the US? If living near humans changes animals, that started at least 25,000 years ago here in North America. Not recently. My neighbors had a pet raccoon growing u…

I think you’re mistaking slight natural adaption for domestication, and taking domestication for granted. Go into nature and try and train a wild wolf. Good luck! You can’t. Domestication, in the way that we see having happened with dogs (and cattle, and chickens) takes a really long time. We consider cats “domesticated” and yet demonstrably they are not. If they were much bigger, they’d eat us, and if set into wild,…

Dogs can easily become feral too, feral dogs will often attack humans, and given the opportunity have been known to eat people.
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