Fishing for Nightlife

We're renting a live trap right now for the raccoon. We've set it up near the front door/porch where we think the 'coon is getting in under our house. On Thursday night last week, put some Friskies brand canned cat food (it was on sale) in the trap and waited.

Just as we were falling asleep (in our warm bed), my spouse heard the trap shut. I didn't hear it and we decided to wait until morning to check the trap. The next morning, we peeked out our front door and sure enough the trap was shut. We couldn't see what was in the trap since we'd wrapped a tarp around the trap to keep the 'coon from playing with the cat food trough the bars. The trap sure was quiet though. We carefully pulled the tarp back and were greeted with the soft watery gaze of a big gray kitty! The kitty looked so happy to see us. Its eyes seemed to say, "Oh, hello! I was cruizin' last night and had this wonderful dinner, but I couldn't get home! I was so sad. I'm so late. I want to go home. Will you help me get out. I'll wait patiently here while you decide."

Well, we laughed and kind of felt bad. We opened the trap and after a second or two, the big gray striped kitty bounded out and loped across the lawn to a hole in the fence. The kitty did not look back. It didn't run away like a feral animal would, though. More like a guilty house cat. We hope its owner is happy to get it back. We trapped a cat, but it was well fed and it stayed dry (due to the tarp).

We've set up the trap again but haven't caught anything more. Maybe the raccoon is too smart for us or it's somewhere else (like next door). We'll see.