COON CHARACTERISTICS 
there they are liable to awake and stir around during warm 
spells, and usually emerge from their torpidity in February or 
early March, when they are so thin and weak as to fall an easy 
prey to wildcats and other foes, and often enter barns and 
even farmhouses in search of food, to the joy of the farmer’s 
boys and dogs. The raccoon eats anything he can get hold 
of; and Kennicott has summed up the matter concisely : — 
“The raccoon,” he says, “is omnivorous. It eats flesh of any kind, 
preying upon small birds and mammals, when it can catch them, and some- 
times making destructive forays into the poultry yard. It devours birds’ 
eggs whenever within reach, procuring the eggs of woodpeckers by thrust- 
ing its paws into their holes; it also watches turtles when depositing their 
eggs in the sand, and, upon their departure, digs them up. This animal is 
fond of fish, and displays remarkable dexterity in capturing them with his 
fore paws. It is also a most successful frog hunter, and may frequently be 
tracked along the river’s edge, where it has been searching for frogs, cray- 
fish, water snails, and dead mussels. In summer, frogs often form a large 
portion of its food, when some species leave the water and therefore are 
easily caught. Insects are eaten to some extent, as are slugs and snails. 
It also feeds largely upon various vegetables in summer; and its particular 
fondness for green corn (maize) is well known to every farmer.”’ 
The coon is as clever as a monkey with his paws; and to 
see one sit up with his back against a log, holding something 
to eat between his hind feet, and daintily picking away and 
handing morsels to his mouth with his paws, is irresistibly 
comic. Give one a half loaf of bread, and he will first of all 
dig a deep round hole down the center of its softest interior, now 
and then cocking up a knowing eye to ask what you think of 
the method. The common name along the southern coasts 
of the United States for the small, narrow, tangled, wild oys- 
ters that grow so abundantly in the salt marshes and. inlets, 
is “coon oyster,” in reference to the practice of the raccoons, 
who come down to feed upon them at high tide. Their par- 
tiality for crayfish, also, is notorious, those living in the far 
Southwest subsisting almost wholly upon these subterranean 
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