Feeding Wildlife

March 7, 2013

Question: I have a question about feeding raccoons. My good-intentioned neighbor puts large pans of dog food out every night for the raccoons. We live in a very close community and the raccoons keep me awake at night with sounds of their fighting over food. They also venture onto my patio to cause more commotion and damage. I’ve tried everything to discourage their visits – ammonia-soaked rags, cayenne pepper, lights, etc. Nothing works.

I’ve tried to talk to my neighbor, telling her it’s not good for wildlife to be fed by an unnatural food source, but she turns a deaf ear. Are there laws against feeding wildlife? Is there any other advice you can give me? (Anonymous)

Answer: While feeding wildlife makes those people doing so feel good, in the long run it is often to the detriment of the animal recipients. Although many animals will eat offered food, temporarily satisfying their hunger, in reality, many human foods lack the protein and nutritional components animals need for good health.

So, although your neighbor may be well-intentioned, she’s actually hurting the wildlife and her neighbors by encouraging wild animals to get too comfortable around humans. When animals concentrate around food, they are more likely to spread diseases to each other and to domestic pets. When wild animals lose their natural fear of humans, they can become very aggressive. Coyotes, in particular, are well-known for eating small pets because they do not differentiate between the food you leave for them and other prey items, like dogs and cats.

People often think they are just feeding cute, furry critters. But if they were to put a surveillance camera out, they would likely be surprised to find out what’s actually eating the food at night. They would probably be appalled to discover animals fighting over the food, and that they’re actually keeping the neighborhood rats fat and happy.

By feeding wildlife, your neighbor may be disrupting the animals’ normal behavior patterns in violation of California Code of Regulations (CCR) Title 14, section 251.1. There may also be a local ordinance that bans feeding of some wild animals. Los Angeles County, for example, has an ordinance that prohibits feeding of “non-domesticated mammalian predators, including but not limited to, coyotes, raccoons, foxes and opossums.”

Feeding raccoons also presents a real human health risk. Raccoons are frequent carriers of a potentially fatal human pathogen, raccoon roundworm, Baylisascaris procyonis. This roundworm is transmitted through contact with the feces of raccoons and has caused fatalities in humans, including toddlers who will put raccoon feces in their mouths.

For more information, please go to: http://www.cdph.ca.gov/healthinfo/discond/Documents/RaccoonRoundworms.pdf.