Has Jimothy Summer given you Procyon lotor fever? Are you looking for a pet more unusual than your run of the mill dog or cat? Do you not care if tiny fingers paw over absolutely everything inside your home? If yes, then you might want to hightail it over to the Volunteer State, cause Tennessee lawmakers have worked tirelessly this year to make it easier — and free! — to adopt raccoons as pets. To be clear, it’s still illegal to capture a raccoon from the wild in Tennessee, so these adoptions are strictly for out-of-state trash pandas. And if citizens look for tips on living with raccoons from Tennessee’s own Wildlife Resource Agency, the expert advice is still, “Raccoons are not pets! Raccoons do not make good pets.” But what do the experts know?!! What could possibly go wrong??!
A U.S. state is making it easier for residents to open their doors to raccoons.
Through a bill that became law last month, Tennessee residents no longer need to pay a US$31 fee for a permit from the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency to adopt raccoons as a pet.
To keep a raccoon, residents must obtain the animals legally, make sure they’re vaccinated, are not native to the area and were not taken from the wild.
The bill was introduced in February and sponsored by Sen. Joey Hensley and Rep. Kip Capley, both Republicans.
“You’d be surprised how many people in Tennessee have reached out and said, ‘We can’t wait for one of these. I’m so excited, thank you!’ Lots and lots. Hundreds, maybe thousands,” Tennessee State Rep. Jeremy Faison (R-Cosby) told Nashville-based WKRN2 news in March.
It is illegal to capture a raccoon from the wild in Tennessee. The state’s wildlife authority advises against keeping them as pets, due to how territorial and aggressive they can be.
A 2025 study found that raccoons are evolving to become cuter and beginning the process of domestication. However, one academic suggested to CTV Toronto that the study might not map perfectly on to Canada, as she says raccoons are not hunted up north like they are in the U.S.
Raccoons are relatively intelligent animals who maintain a mixed reputation as mischievous, but loveable pests. Cities like Toronto, Seattle and Ashland, Va., have all celebrated local viral raccoons.
However, the animals can also carry rabies and other parasites, and can become extremely territorial and violent when they reach maturity.
Some cities have tried to develop trash bins specifically to counter the tricky critters, as they’ve been known to break into many containers. Nonetheless they’ve been celebrated in video games and photo contests.
Raccoons live across North America and are extremely adaptable to new and changing environments.
For the record: I am not against the idea of raccoons as pets. Like this article referenced, it is true that scientists are observing domestication traits in raccoons that live in close proximity to humans. For instance, the snouts of urban raccoons are starting to average about 3.5% shorter than those of rural raccoons. But these signs are still very early stages. On the other hand, according to Instagram (which is always an accurate reflection of reality), there are many happily homed trash panda floofs living high on the hog with humans. As long as it’s legal in your state (check!), and you have the time, patience, and training to, well, train a raccoon to be a home pet, then peace be with you. I also looked up “What’s it like having a raccoon as a pet?” on Reddit, where many commenters wrote it off as not unlike any other common house pet. The comment that stuck with me, though, was: “It’s like having a really small crackhead that lives in your house rent free and has terrible coordination and impulse control.” I have on my own enough terrible impulse control for one household, thankyouverymuch.
Lastly, it’s curious that this action has been a Republican-sponsored endeavor, no?
Photos credit: Alan Alquist and Gary Bendig on Unsplash, Patrice Schoefolt on Pexels
As someone who lives in TN, I love to see the state legislature laser focused on the challenges facing their constituents. Way to keep your fingers on the pulse, people.
Personally, I’d rather have heath care than a racoon, but I’m an outlier. At least they managed to get SOMETHING accomplished. JFC.
Who needs health insurance when you can have a trash panda! s/ Seriously this sounds like a terrible idea
I lived in the Deep South for six years & I gotta say, reading about the evolution of raccoons to cuter I just thought, yeah, sure, Tennesseans aren’t going to fall for that explanation. Evolution? That’s for communists! /s
How do they know if your raccoon was impacted from your cousin’s yard in Kentucky or just a kit you captured in your own yard?
My question exactly. Are they doing some very expensive, very high-tech, blood isotope testing? For each critter?
“However, the animals can also carry rabies and other parasites”
What could possibly go wrong?
After everything Felon47’s maladministration, especially the coke-addled brainworm, have done to gut healthcare, scrap preventative measures, vilify vaccines like tetanus…
Torontonian here: don’t get a raccoon as a pet. They are prone to rabies, their poop is toxic to other animals, they eat drywall and wires and they have a life expectancy of about 3 years. Don’t do it.
And pretty soon the animal shelters will be dealing with the “ Lots and lots. Hundreds, maybe thousands,” of animals that people realise they cannot handle in their home. Assuming they don’t just dump them somewhere.
My husband’s boyhood friend had a pet raccoon named Roo. The trouble started when the raccoon reached adolescence. He was so mean! You’d be walking across a room, and Roo would hide until the time was right, and then race over and bite your ankles. Yeah, hard pass on raccoons!
One night last summer we heard noises in the guest bathroom. When we opened the door a raccoon was on the ledge outside, removing the window screen. He was unfazed by our presence and hubby had to eventually use a broom to (gently) shoo him away.
Oh, goodness!
This does not sound good for the raccoons. If people choose to disregard all the legitimate advice and bring one into their home they deserve everything they get and I feel sorry for the animal.
I’m sure plenty of people are making it look cute on social media but I’d bet money what you see is only a small part of what it’s actually like.
I live with a senior cat who looks absolutely delightfully on his IG but I don’t post about the many times he has a bad stomach and then walks it through the house or his incessant screaming (Siamese ancestry) including standing on the bed at 4am (his volume is equivalent to a human being loud, it’s no joke), or any of his other foibles that make him something of a nightmare to live with these days.
I read and loved the book “Rascal” as a child, but I never seriously thought that a raccoon would be a good pet, no matter how cute they are. It’s their upholstery, I guess, but in my opinion a wild animal is a wild animal.
As long as they’re vaccinated against rabies and see a vet regularly, that part is just like other pets. BUT… raccoons can be super destructive. I know dogs and cats can damage furniture, but raccoons will tunnel through your drywall.
A rehab specialist told me they get a lot of surrendered foxes that people tried to keep as pets, not realizing how destructive they are and also how bad they smell. I feel like this will happen with raccoons — a lot of surrendered animals that someone now has to find a place for.
Oh the memories I have from raising an orphaned raccoon! There is never a day when I don’t think of her. We live in a very rural area and she eventually lived a more normal raccoon life, but she knew she could always come home for cuddles and snacks.
We built her a tree house before her second winter and she had her first baby there and then she found better digs somewhere in the woods.
I will say that it was a lot. She had the run of the house and you never knew quite what you would come home to! I’d say like a toddler crossed with a monkey but sweeter than you could believe. We did not make any attempt to domesticate her many generations of babies and they did not usually choose to come into the house.
I think a good thing about making raccoons legal pets would be the ability to get vaccines. I can see downsides though, if they aren’t able to roam and explore.
She never destroyed anything in the house, even without supervision. Except a spider plant and a leftover bucket of KFC.
I feel like this is the extent of involvement we should have with raccoons. I absolutely love them–they are beyond cute–but I believe what others are saying above about the level of destruction. I’m not sure that can be trained out of them (although maybe with natural evolution that comes with domestication?) but I bet most people don’t wanna find out.
I definitely support people rehabbing and looking out for our beloved trash pandas though–as long as it’s done safely and with the advice/guidance of a wildlife expert.
When I read the headline and throughout the article in my head it went…
🪕 Ding ding ding ding ding ding ding ding ding 🪕
Which if you can’t make out the tune, it’s the unmistakeable twangs of the Deliverance movie banjo theme.
I don’t say this lightly, but I’m not sure how else you commuicate that you’re a full-on white trash state than legalizing racoons as pets. As many commenters, and experts, have noted they do not make good pets. So many knock-on effects from this of raccoon kit mills, stealing from the wild, disease transfer, overwhmelming shelters (who will accept them?).
This will not go well. Raccoons are absolutely adorable and absolutely crazy. When they go on a rampage they can kill a large dog. I would not want them around children or other pets. Of all the things to pass.
This is bad news for raccoons and bad news for people. Baby raccoons are cute and tame, but frequently once they hit puberty, they become unsuitable as house pets. Wild raccoons can carry leptospirosis, which is a nasty bacteria they can pass to humans.
Japan had a pet raccoon craze that went very badly.
https://www.ewash.org/does-japan-allow-raccoons-as-pets/
They are SO cute. Just like foxes and bats, I’m happy to watch adorable videos all day, far, far away from my house.
Not native to the area? So how is a person supposed to prove that? Seriously, how? Or are they simply asked, ‘is this a Tennessee raccoon’ and if the answer is ‘nope’, then you’re OK? And why on earth could you simply not provide housing & food & water & toys to the raccoon who wanders into your backyard night after night? Why does it have to be an out of state raccoon? (And I’m still hung up on how you prove that.)
Perhaps there’s a SAVE Act motive. Assume Tennessee legislators accepted a challenge to their reading level and mostly paged through Rascal, enjoying the illustrations. Ever eager to bow, scrape, and snivel before Orange Satan, whose SAVE Act cowpie lacks support from the usual swarm of Congressional blowflies, these wily evolution deniers and pig-squeal enthusiasts saw an opportunity. Draft a bill promoting raccoon ownership, but exclude born-and-bred Volunteer State animals from such bondage. By extension, these homeland raccoons require identification. Run a grift: issue for purchase a tranche of raccoon IDs with Cheeto on the front and, on the flip side, a warm, fuzzy photo of a different type of bandit. Then proudly point out that Tennessee-issued ID cards protect the freedom of the state’s heritage raccoons, whose ancestors rooted trash at Shilo and Murfreesboro.
Oh, my, heritage raccoons!!! 🤣
Wild animals are terrible pets!!! And it is cruel
Bad idea for the people, the raccoons, and the readers of this ridiculous article. Life in America sucks, so get yourself a raccoon! I can even see Trump making a speech to this effect. The ruin of this nation continues one awful/dumb decision at a time. What next? Adopt a giraffe?
I’ve shared this story on posts before, but as someone who had a full run of rabies shots because of a juvenile rabid raccoon coming into her home to attack a cat… no, just no. It was still tiny, probably barely weaned and still terrifying. I can’t imagine how much damage a full grown one deciding to attack, or just have fun rampaging through a home, could do. They’re adorable, but they don’t belong outside of trained, competent rehabbers.