Neighbor Rusty, who lives on the upper reaches of Treat on the north slope, recently played host to an uninvited guest, and his security camera captured the house party:
A raccoon came in through the cat door the other night while I was away. He spent about 5 minutes chowing down, then decided to chill out and finally WENT TO SLEEP for 30 minutes before leaving. (He then came back around 2 hours later for a second round of snacks, but only stayed for a few minutes that time.)
My cat seemed oblivious to the whole thing. Lazy cat!
I now have to keep the cat door locked at night.
On the bright side, Bernalwood sources say the raccoon left some very nice comments about Neighbor Rusty’s home on Airbnb.
PHOTO: Security camera images from Neighbor Rusty
Bernalwood 
We live on Mullen and had Raccoon visitors on the night of the 3rd! They were hanging out next door and we heard them making so much noise in the middle of the night. it was a Raccoon party! When we went out, they got curious and started staring at us, maybe wondering if there would be more food in our yard. We saw a very big one first, then two other smaller ones, and who knows how many were there. We took some pictures, but then went inside because they didn’t seem scared of us at all.
They made so much noise all night and destroyed the bird feeder (which we decided not to leave outside anymore), made a hole in the ground, and with their little hands, they were able to open the door that goes into the crawlspace. The next day, we sprinkled the Raccoon deterrent near the fence and we haven’t seen them since… and we hope they don’t come back.
Be super careful picking up their poop if they left any, the stuff is wicked toxic.
Wow – until you posted that and I googled, I had no idea how dangerous raccoon feces were!
Be glad your cat did not go after the raccoon, she could have been hurt. Raccoons can be vicious.
What kind of camera/system was used?
I think the same guy takes a nap on a chair in our yard, or maybe there are 2 narcoleptic raccoons running around Bernal. Anyway, never had any problems between our cats and the raccoons on this hill. They leave each other alone, at least in our yard.
A very interesting documentary about how raccoons have successfully adapted to urban life.
http://video.pbs.org/video/2192070266/
It’s a $60 D-Link camera, http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004P8K24W/ with some custom software to grab the images. Not impressed with the mount on the camera which is cheap and flimsy, but the built-in IR illuminator works great at night.
A few months back, we propped open the door to our porch on a hot night. When we closed it before going to bed, we noticed little three-toed claw prints on the breakfast room’s built-in bench, near where we keep the dog food (in a sealed container). We’re *very* glad our dog didn’t notice the visitor; she would definitely have gone after the raccoon and I’m sure it would not have ended well.