The Saga of Rocky the Racoon

It is always a good idea to pay attention to what your spouse is saying to you, especially if she says it repeatedly. Such was the case, recently, when my wife reported that she had been hearing something on the roof of the house. “What could be on the roof?”, I thought.  Maybe a large bird had temporarily landed there?

She insisted that whatever it was that had been visiting our roof came at night and made scratching sounds, as if it had claws. I still dismissed this as perhaps a fiction of her imagination or a visitation in her dreams. Then, one day, while working in my office, I heard something too. It sounded like something had fallen. Perhaps something in one of the closets had shifted and fallen down?  I would look into to it later. Which I never did.

Then came the night, actually early morning, whilst I was soundly asleep that my spouse awakened me, saying, “I hear it again”.  Her tone of voice was such that I determined I had better take action, which I did, grabbing a flashlight and going out into the rain to examine the roof line – front and back sides of the house. Nothing.

Unable to get back to sleep I decided to read, seated in my recliner in the family room, thinking I might get drowsy again. It was then that I heard “something”. Only, I knew it wasn’t on the roof but in the attic. So, flashlight in hand, I pulled down the attic stairs and crept up above the garage to investigate. As I shined my light around a pair of eyes shined right back at me. Then those eyes scampered up the studs of the exterior wall – eyes belonging to a small racoon. It quickly made it’s way up and into the eaves of the house. I’m not sure who was more surprised by our early morning meeting, me or the racoon?

With heart racing and in disbelief, while wondering: “How did it possibly get inside the attic?”, I went to report my findings to the now trying to go back to sleep spouse. My report did nothing to encourage her resumption of slumber. Instead, we grappled with the fact that we had a critter in the attic. What now?

It was the Memorial Day holiday weekend, meaning that none of the animal abatement companies I called for help answered their phones. One company did call back but said they could only respond on Tuesday. It was early Saturday and I knew action needed to be taken sooner if any semblance of holiday habitation (ours not the racoon’s) was going to proceed over the weekend.

So, I resolved to purchase a livetrap, while the Mrs. called our daughter and son-in-law, who quickly agreed to come “check things out”. Meanwhile I’d begun calling our mischievous, masked bandit by the name of “Rocky”. I did not (do not) know if Rocky was male or female, but told myself that being rather of an adolescent size it (he/she) surely did not have a nest of kits on site.

Once back with said livetrap in hand, the racoon calvary arrived to lend assistance. Our daughter and son-in-law brought the three grandsons with him, who were quite excited about the prospect of Lolly and Grandad having a racoon living in the attic! The two younger boys were dressed up as racoons, eager to meet the imposter, while their older brother was planning to be part of the investigative team.

They, son-in-law and grandson, being a bit more nimble and agile than Grandad, led the investigation, exploring the nooks and crannies of said attic, looking for evidence of Rocky’s occupancy, and (more importantly) how the heck Rocky kept getting in and out of the place. Sure enough, we found the critter’s preferred latrine spot, in addition to evidence of his trails of exploration, and speculated on a couple of small spaces where it may have been possible for him/her to squeeze into the spacious, warm and comfortable attic.

The interior discovery having been settled, I let my son-in-law, cover the exterior and rooftop search, pointing from ground level to those couple of places that I thought may have been entry points.  “Awfully small”, he said. “It’s not a very big racoon, though. And I bet they can squeeze themselves through pretty small spaces”, I replied.

The livetrap set, baited with mini marshmallows’ by the eldest grandson, we closed things up and waited for our after dark visitor. Sure enough, about 9:15 p.m. we heard a loud clank, we assumed to be the trap closing, followed by feverish scratching sounds.

Knowing the rest of the trapping party would want to be in on the spoils, a text was sent to report the latest, despite our certainty that the grandsons would have long been in bed. This, however, could not wait until morning, so my son-in-law and I re-entered the attic – which in the six years we’ve lived in the house I had never been in so often, and there it was – Rocky the racoon – confined, trapped and not too happy about it. But all the marshmallows were gone.

Pictures were taken of the dexterous, opportunistic, nocturnal bandit and our son-in-law offered to take him away (far away) for release. We learned later that he first went home to awaken the oldest grandson to join him on this caper. It seemed only justified that the grandson who had been part of the search was also afforded the spoils of being part of the catch and release. His two little brothers would have to be satisfied with pictures. 

A later report by the grandson back to his grandparents, said Rocky seemed quite pleased with the new environs, “looking happy” as it scampered away into the woods with a nice creek flowing nearby.  The bandit had been re-homed.

It’s been a week since all of this transpired.  In that time, we’ve had the animal abatement company out to do their thing – further investigate, set additional traps just to be certain Rocky was a loner (thank goodness that was the case) and take care of clean up to mitigate the impact of a masked, ring tailed, visitor’s aftereffects. No doubt we are the talk of the neighborhood, as the company’s bright insignia vehicles did all but shout – “this is the house with the racoon!” 

We never thought, as occupants of a modern, subdivision setting home, with neighbors all around – many of whom I’m guessing have much nicer and more spacious attic’s than ours – that we would be “those people”. But we are. Rocky saw to it that we are “those people” who had a racoon move into their attic.

It just goes to show you. You never know what the challenges, complexities and opportunities of home ownership will bring your way. I know way more about the habits and behaviors of racoons than I did prior to last weekend. I can now add live trapping to my resume, and we have three grandsons who are experienced racoon hunters – all thanks to Rocky.

So, if your spouse says to you, out of the blue. “I think I’ve been hearing something on the roof”. My suggestion is that you do not ignore it. We did, after all, turn Rocky loose within the county – as state law prescribes.  Who knows, your attic may be next.  Then, you too can become some of “those people”.

Daniel M. Cash © 2026