Do Raccoons climb fences?

Raccoons have a powerful body structure that helps them climb and run through regular and irregular surfaces, and people often wonder how they manage to climb fences higher than 10 feet. Experts even suggest that you should not waste your money on building higher fences because raccoons have been found to climb over wire and concrete fences. When raccoons get over your fence and gain access into the attic, they can tear up insulations erected on walls, they can even climb over the stalks and tear them down just to gain access to crops(especially grains). Raccoons can grab and claw through softer fence materials, especially those made of soft wood, they create holes in such fences . Metal fences are quite difficult for raccoons to climb because of the slippery surfaces of such materials.



While baby raccoons will find it difficult to climb over 5-6inches wire fences, adult raccoons have been found to climb over fences higher than 8 inches in height. Raccoons are excellent tree climbers, they can use their ever-growing claws to attach their entire bodies to trees and then use their hind legs to lift their heavy bodies. There seem to be no fence tall enough to stop raccoons from climbing over and gaining access to your garden, and even stored foodstuffs and pet foods.

The best possible way to control the activities of raccoons around your property is to set traps for them and then release them into the wild or call an animal control agency to pick them up. Catching raccoons is not easy as well, you will have to use baits on a covered trap. In most countries, the shooting of raccoons are not permitted, however trapping is allowed but they must be evacuated from the environment or reported to animal rehabilitation center.

Another effective way of controlling raccoons climbing over your fence is to erect electric wires over such fences. Electric shocks are quite lethal on raccoons, and depending on the voltage of the electricity, they may be decapitated r even killed, but when they eventually escaped, they are intelligent enough not to return to that same place. Aside the use of electric fences and walls, the use of aggressive dogs for hunting raccoons for sport is also common especially in some Northern American countries , however, this has been banned for a reason, especially with the depletion of raccoon populations and indiscriminate hunting of the animals for sports.


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