Pest Profile: Raccoons

Some people may find them cute, but raccoons can do major damage to a lawn, especially to new turf.

One way to prevent them from ending up around your home is to not give them a home on your property, says Roger Baldwin, IPM wildlife pest management advisor at the University of California's Kearney Agricultural Research and Extension Center.

That means removing things like wood piles or overgrown shrubbery.

"Helping to reduce that cover for them can help reduce desirability of an area for raccoons," Baldwin says.

Lawn & Landscape spoke with Baldwin about what you need to know when dealing with raccoons at a customer's (or your own) property.
 

What kind of damage can raccoons do to lawns?

Primarily the damage they will do to lawns is rolling up turf. Sometimes after turf is newly laid, they'll come and roll it up looking for worms, grubs and insects. So, that's the kind of damage they are going to cause to an actual lawn. Now, if you've got gardens, then you have consumption of those particular food sources, things like corn, watermelon, and other fruits and vegetables like that, which they'll get into.
 

What kind of specific foods do they go after?

Raccoons will eat just about anything. Preferred foods include fruits and vegetables, as well as a variety of animals including insects, grubs, worms, song birds, rodents, and frogs. Ultimately, this could lead to greater damage from raccoons to lawns and gardens. Garbage can also be an attractant, as raccoons are obviously quite good at getting into garbage cans.
 

How can you prevent them from tearing up your lawn?

If you've just laid down turf and anticipate some type of problem along those lines, you can use electric fencing – basically running a couple of wires of electric fencing around the perimeter of the area that you'd just laid the turf down on. Typical fencing will involve two strands of wire. The first wire is usually about 6 inches above ground and the next one usually is about another 6 inches above that.

If it's an area where you are concerned about your neighbors, pets or pedestrians getting zapped, you should let them know that you are going to erect the electric fencing. It would also be a good idea to post the site, saying 'This is a hot wire, don't touch.' The fencing would give anyone who touched it a pretty good shock, but it shouldn't cause any permanent damage to humans or other animals.
 

How else can you prevent raccoons from doing damage?

The only other effective option is removal, and in some cases, it is your best or only option. Trapping is probably the easiest way to remove raccoons from an area. However, trapping laws vary tremendously from state to state. They are typically considered a fur bearer, which means you can't just indiscriminately remove them. However, if they are causing damage on your property, most states have clauses that allow you to remove those individuals. But that is something that they would have to check with their local authorities to find out what they can and cannot do with respect to removal of raccoons. And for individuals who don't know what they are doing with respect to trapping and other removal-related issues, usually they are better off bringing in professionals to do that.
 

How long do you leave up the fence?

The time period will depend on the length of time required for the turf to become well established. Once the grass becomes fairly well embedded and growing well, then usually you don't have a problem with raccoons rolling up new portions of turf anymore.
 

Are there chemicals that keep raccoons away?

Unfortunately, for most of the wildlife pests we have, they don't typically work that well. There are some exceptions, but raccoons are not one of those exceptions.

So you'll see repellents that will be marketed for raccoons, but I'm not aware of any research that's ever shown that they are effective at keeping raccoons out of those particular areas.

The author is an associate editor at Lawn & Landscape. He can be reached at bhorn@gie.net.