Masked bandits at night

I blogged recently about how DH and DD have been handfeeding the chipmunks in our yard. Not surprisingly, the local wildlife seems to have decided that our property is restaurant central. We came home the other day and found a chipmunk inside the bird feeder that hangs in the tree outside the front door! The squirrels have claimed the feeders hanging from the back deck. They get very frustrated with the thistle seed feeder because the openings are so small, but it doesn't stop them from repeatedly trying to get seed out of it. The birds hang around waiting for the squirrels to get tired or full (they eventually do!) so they can have their turn.

Soooo . . . we had been blaming the squirrels for the speed at which the bird feeders were emptying, but the other night DH happened to look out of the kitchen window and saw not one but THREE raccoons on the deck, two of them up on the railing stuffing themselves silly with sunflower seeds. They didn't even turn around when we knocked on the window. They barely seemed to notice when we switched the outside light on. One of them even came right up to the glass door and looked in - with the kids' faces pressed right up to the glass on the inside! Fortunately,  even DH agreed that there is no way THESE animals are going to be hand-fed. They are too big, and potentially too dangerous. We were all tempted to open the door though because it was really difficult to get a good photo in such poor light from the other side of a window or glass door. This was the best of a bunch of photos: