In This Boot Camp, the Recruits Are Baby Raccoons

Muddy, sweat-soaked, and occasionally bloody, the dedicated staff at a Mississippi wildlife center are drill sergeants. Their soldiers? Baby raccoons. Welcome to raccoon boot camp, where the goal is to help sick or injured animals learn to survive in the wilderness—skills they would have learned from their mothers, most of whom died or were separated from their kits by storms, traffic accidents, or other traumatic events. It's a challenge that's left Woodside Wildlife Rescue's founder, Paula Woodside, with cuts from scared, defensive raccoons and their sharp claws, reports the AP. "When these babies come in, and they're so desperate, it's heartbreaking," said Woodside, who most days is covered in sweat from caring for the animals in the Mississippi heat, and dirt from curious kits crawling onto her shoulders. "It's really important for them to get a little bit of a head start."

Woodside, a former US merchant mariner, opened the rescue in 2019 after she helped rehabilitate a baby raccoon found aboard her ship. The rescue in coastal Pass Christian typically raises dozens of kits each year, 76 so far this year, alongside other indigenous wildlife. City animal control and citizens call Woodside, or the rescue's director, Raquel Priest, when they find a raccoon in need of saving. Together, they attempt to reunite the kits with their mothers, or bring the kits to the rescue. The youngest raccoons will spend a few weeks mostly indoors being bottle-fed by rehabbers until they're vaccinated for diseases carried by cat colonies and dogs and are ready to move to outdoor pens.

Though the kits stay close to their adoptive human parents, they're eventually allowed to roam free during the day on the rescue's rural 20-acre property, a sprawling mix of meadows and thick forest spotted with ponds and a nearby river. Thanks to that setting, Woodside and Priest can take their troops on learning excursions, a luxury many wildlife rescues don't have, Woodside said. Where a drill sergeant might yell, 'Attention!,' Priest and Woodside give a shrill trilling sound, mimicking the raccoon call for danger, that sends the kits running up trees to safety. A short whistle lets the troops know the coast is clear. The kits also practice fishing in shallow pools, their uncoordinated paws tentatively patting the water until they're quick enough to snag a snack. A live quail hunt provides hunting experience.

For their final lesson, a volunteer traps the raccoons in cages, scaring them enough to encourage them to avoid traps and wean themselves from their human rescuers. When a group of kits is ready for release, after about six months, Woodside and Priest host a graduation ceremony. They play Edward Elgar's "Pomp and Circumstance Marches," and read a roll call of each graduating kit's name. A reverend then blesses their journey as they're released onto a different section of the rescue's forest-covered property. "It's like watching your children leave home," Priest says. "It's important to see them prosper and go and be the mischievous creatures they were meant to be."