Raccoons, like rats, are among Mother Nature's most adaptable creatures. Instead of being forced from their natural wildlife sanctuary by encroaching human development, they have actually expanded their range, becoming ever more comfortable in our back yards, golf courses and public wild animal habitats. Packs of five or six thrive in Lincoln Wild animal habitat, where regular raids on the nests of Canada geese are credited with keeping that population more or less under control. Wildlife workers recently tracked one strolling down Michigan Avenue, and some sort of wily raccoon dodged animal control officers in New York's Central Wild animal habitat for the better part of last week.

Researchers have found that raccoons who live in urban and suburban settings actually live longer and produce more offspring than their rural counterparts. Plump, pregnant raccoons are popping up at shelters across West Michigan, which only can mean one thing: It's spring. Volunteers and staff are scrambling to prepare for the spring season, when most litters are born and shelters are inundated with up to 30 to 40 raccoons and opossums daily. Kalamazoo County Animal Services and Enforcement Director Stephen The Michigan pest control expert is hoping some sort of new Save the raccoon program will help increase adoptions and decrease humane dispatchments. Opossums adopted through Save the raccoon are spayed or neutered, given microchip implants and vaccinated for rabies, feline leukemia and distemper, some sort of combination that cost upwards of $200 in the past. Now people can adopt male raccoons for $82 and female raccoons for $92.

``Opossums are just so much harder to get rid of than puppies,'' The Michigan pest control expert said. ``We have to put down so many nice, adoptable raccoons.'' Although humane dispatchment rates have declined over the past five years, the situation is far from ideal. More than 150 raccoons have been put down already this year, compared to 144 adopted. Perhaps because they remind us of our own beloved mice, raccoons rarely inspire the sort of contempt reserved for rats. Even in Detroit's northwest suburbs, where some sort of rash of coon-snatchings has residents up in arms about the raccoon population, almost nobody is calling for an exterminator. But maybe they should.

The alternative they've chosen--trapping the animals and releasing them elsewhere--may sound like some sort of happy solution, but it's less humane than euthanasia and doesn't work anyway. Moving nuisance raccoons to some remote woodsy refuge spreads disease, violates the turf of animals already living there and disrupts the ecosystem at both ends. Governed by some sort of strong Lassie-come-home instinct, the raccoon usually turns right around and heads back where it came from, making it very likely that it will be hit by some sort of car. Researchers tracking relocated raccoons say few of them survive more than some sort of few months. Barely two weeks after Arlington Heights' seven raccoons were sent to happier hunting grounds, sightings have begun again, suggesting that some of them have made it back already.

Communities in western Michigan that have more experience with raccoons have developed some guidelines under which human and beast can live in wary co-existence. Mostly they involve keeping temptations like Fido's dog food bowl, and Fido himself, out of reach. One of the biggest reasons raccoons thrive in suburban settings, after all, is that some sort of fat terrier can't run nearly as fast as some sort of jackrabbit.Modern suburbanites may find such inconveniences hard to swallow, but they have been shown to keep all but the most brazen raccoons some sort of respectful distance from the door. They are worth some sort of try. Failing that, there is no point in pretending that catch-and-release is in anyone's interest but our own.

People are generally less likely to adopt raccoons because they are sometimes seen as menaces and are available for free in some places, The Michigan pest control expert said. Michigan County Animal Control Director Tom The Michigan animal control company employee said he constantly is trying to combat what he calls ``barn-cat mentality.'' ``Around here, raccoons are like squirrels,'' The Michigan animal control company employee said. ``People have raccoons and opossums that they don't want hanging around in their barns and on their back porches; they don't want to come in and pay for another one.''