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   When I put jelly out for the orioles in the spring, I expect a certain amount of loss to raccoons. The usual solution is to put out a live trap, catch the raccoons, and take them for a “ride to grandpa’s house” as the saying goes. This year has been different. Baiting the trap with grape jelly and a bonus of marshmallows, I have not caught a raccoon despite the bait being stolen. I thought it was impossible for anything to get into and out of the trap without setting it off and being caught. Overnight, if I left the orioles jelly dish out, it would be empty as well as the bait from the trap. My solution was to set up a motion detecting camera to see what was going on.

   After four days, I checked it this morning, there were 892 pictures on it. A considerable amount of time is required to go through that many pictures. There were several interesting photos that helped, at least partially, solve the great mystery. During this time, I caught and released two rabbits. Matching the times of the photos with the time the marshmallows disappeared, I was able to determine, much to my surprise, rabbits do eat marshmallows. Pictures taken during the daytime would often show a female oriole inside the trap eating the jelly. She could fly to the dish containing the jelly inside the trap without hitting the trigger that would catch her. At night, I had several pictures of something else going into the trap to raid the jelly. The pictures are dark enough it is impossible to determine for sure, but it looks like either a bat or flying squirrel walking along the side of the cage, avoiding the trigger, and getting any jelly left by the clever female oriole.

   As far as the thief of the jelly in the oriole feeder on the tree; that is a raccoon. Whenever the jelly dish is left in the feeder overnight, it is empty and laying in the yard somewhere nearby.  I have several pictures of him looking into but not entering the trap. He will eat the jelly from the oriole feeder, then check the jelly in the trap, but never go in. For some reason, he is wise to the situation, and it is not because he has been trapped before. Nothing returns from a “ride to grandpa’s house.”

   If we leave the live trap out long enough, we most likely will catch a raccoon in a moment of weakness. Until then, we will probably catch one or two of everything else in the area. Perhaps they will learn to stay out of places they do not belong. If not, it is not a problem releasing things like rabbits, orioles and flying squirrels, but I think my wife might draw the line at opening the trap door for a bat. She thinks of them as mice with wings and she does not like mice.

   At least now, the mystery of the bait being stolen out of the trap had been solved, probably. Rather than it being one very clever animal sneaking in and out of the trap, it appears that it is several different species at different times of the day and night. It is nice to know with what we are dealing.

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