Animal House

Every Wednesday I volunteer at a nature center. Mostly this nature center focuses on educational programs for school children and rehabilitation for injured animals.. The animals we take in our mostly non-domestic creatures that most people don't know what to do with....nuisance animals I guess you could call them. Turtles, possums, raccoons, etc.
When I went in this past week, I entered the "rat room". The rat room mostly houses animals that are going to be at the nature center temporarily.
As I entered, I heard the most vicious growling noise I've ever heard! I crept in, turned on the light, and beheld the surliest raccoon I've ever laid eyes upon. It was growling one minute and making some other disturbing noise the next. It looked as if it's back leg was injured and couldn't move around very well. I crept near him but as I got closer he got more agitated so I backed off. I realized that I would have to feed and water him but I was too scared at the moment to think of how I was going to do this. In the end I put on two HUGE leather gloves (used to handle our large birds of prey) and tried to cajole the little raccoon to settle down a bit. I slid the food into his little pen and that's when he attacked my hand!....Thank goodness for leather, I could have been a rabies victim! After the initial interest and attack on me, he dove for the food. I guess "dove" isn't the correct word since we couldn't move all that well....perhaps, lunged. Yes, he lunged for the food and paid me no more attention.
Since I mentioned rabies I thought I'd include this little known fact: Unlike raccoons, possums are not carriers of rabies. There have been a few cases but it is VERY RARE for possums to ever have rabies.