May 20, 2007 – Raccoons Make Poor Electricians

As life on the farm goes, one thig leads to another.  About 5:30 a.m. one of the goats started bawling.  Nellie had managed to escape over the barn door and separated from the herd, was freaking out.  In going out, I let the dog out and Maizie promptly chased a raccoon up a power pole.


The raccoon was perched above a transformer and I feared for the damage the raccoon could do to the transformer (our electric co-op printed a list of reasons why transformers fail, and animals were the #1 reason).  I contemplated taking the raccoon out with a .22, but thought only two bad things could happen – I could miss and hit the transfomer or other piece of the electric grid, or I could get the raccoon, and its fall could break something on the way down – so I decided to lock the dogs up again and hope the raccoon would climb down on its own.  If it wasn’t 5:30 am Sunday morning I may have called the co-op for guidance.  About an hour later, we heard a terribly loud buzzing, arcing sound, the power blinked off briefly, and when I went out to make sure all the fuse boxes were intact, I found the crispy raccoon at the base of the power pole, its fur all singed. It was kind of creepy – so I showed all the kids and impressed upon them the importance of not messing with electricity!

one year ago…