Japan struggles with invasive raccoon inhabitants

Norman Ray

World Courant

Japan’s raccoon plague has gotten considerably worse over the previous decade, a number of Japanese information sources report.

Practically 1,300 raccoons have been captured in fiscal 2022, the Tokyo authorities mentioned. That is about 5 instances the quantity arrested a decade in the past, Kyodo Information, a Japanese information company, reported.

In 2013, the Japanese authorities reiterated the necessity to management raccoons as an invasive species.

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Raccoons should not native to Japan, however have been delivered to the nation within the Nineteen Seventies following the recognition of the 1977 anime.Criminal the raccoon.”

The anime was primarily based on the autobiographical novel “Rascal, A Memoir of a Higher Period” by Sterling North. Within the ebook, North talks about elevating a child raccoon, Rascal.

Raccoons are answerable for tens of millions of {dollars} in agricultural injury in Japan yearly, the Japanese authorities says. (Miroslav Srb / Comedy Wildlife 2022)

In response to the present, folks in Japan started importing raccoons to maintain as pets.

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At its peak, greater than 1,500 raccoons have been imported into Japan annually, in accordance with Smithsonian Journal.

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However though the Japanese authorities moved rapidly to ban each the importation of raccoons and their conserving as pets, it was too little, too late.

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Raccoons do not make simple pets, says proprietor Jaime Arslan two rescue raccoonswrote on her Instagram web page for her raccoons Louie and Lucy.

Raccoons should not native to Japan and don’t have any pure predators. They’ve additionally confirmed to be very adept at evading traps and different eradication measures. (Photograph Alliance by way of Getty Photographs)

Raccoons, she mentioned, “might be very damaging in a house” and have to be always entertained. Moreover, raccoons can and do chew, both as aggression or as a type of play.

Their care can also be extraordinarily costly, as most veterinarians won’t see a raccoon.

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Many Japanese households discovered these classes the onerous approach and easily launched their raccoons into the wild after they grew to become unruly in entrance of their properties.

As a result of raccoons in Japan don’t have any pure predators, they have been in a position to rapidly set up a inhabitants and are actually present in every of the nation’s 47 prefectures, in accordance with Kyodo Information.

Raccoons should not authorized as pets in Japan. (iStock)

Along with the injury to the surroundings, the raccoon invasion has additionally wreaked havoc on the nation’s agricultural sector, in accordance with Kyodo Information.

In 2022, raccoons have been blamed for inflicting practically $3 million in crop injury, they mentioned.

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Controlling the raccoons has confirmed extraordinarily troublesome as a consequence of their clever nature, in accordance with Kyodo Information.

Native efforts to entice the raccoons or to right away contact officers upon seeing injury brought on by a raccoon have “thus far confirmed ineffective.”

Raccoons are additionally determined to reside.

“Our traps are typically damaged as a result of raccoons are additionally determined to reside. Solely a fraction are literally caught, so we’re unable to find out their complete vary,” an official from a municipality in western Tokyo advised Kyodo Information.

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Japan is not the one nation coping with invasive raccoons. In Germany, raccoons have been imported there within the Nineteen Thirties for his or her fur. The animals have been launched into the wild, the place they have been in a position to set up a inhabitants, identical to in Japan.

In 2023, there have been a number of studies of raccoons breaking into German properties, making a large number and stealing beer, in accordance with Meals & Wine journal. And in 2019, a drunken raccoon visited a Christmas market in Erfurt, Germany.

The raccoon, which reportedly drank leftover mulled wine, was shot lifeless by a hunter, German media mentioned.

For extra life-style articles, go to www.foxnews.com/life-style

Christine Rousselle is a life-style reporter at Fox Information Digital.

Japan struggles with invasive raccoon inhabitants

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