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Name: |
Babe
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Age: |
Three years old
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Gender: |
Female
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Kind: |
Crab-eating Raccoon
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Home: |
Wanica, Suriname, South America
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The
name of my pet is "Babe", she is a crab-eating raccoon from
Suriname. She is two years of age now and my daughter brought her home
when she was maybe six or seven weeks old. She was found near a road in the
district of Para in Suriname, the country where I live in South America.
When she was found she was deserted and wounded and the people that
found her brought her to Paramaribo Zoo, where my daughter worked for a
few months. Because it wasn't possible to give Babe the necessary care
to keep her alive there we took Babe into our house. That meant several
times a day feeding her with kitten milk and later when she started to
grow with fruits like papaya, watermelon, fish, dog food, meat, etc.,
because the raccoon is an omnivore.
During the first year of her life she lived in our house and she
destroyed everything: the ceiling, the carpet, the furniture. Nothing
was safe for her. Then my wife and me decided to give her an own room
downstairs a little bit apart from the rest of the house, so we could
repair the damages she'd caused.
In the beginning Babe escaped several times from her new room,
especially at night, and then she went upstairs, entered the house via
the roof and came to our bedroom, because that's where she thinks she
belongs: with us in her house.
Since we improved her place downstairs she can't escape anymore.
Sometimes I let her walk and search in the garden, where she can find
snails and play with the dogs, who know her very well.
Every evening I spent some time with her in her room. Sometimes she
comes down from the (rests of) the ceiling via a tree that we placed
inside. But mostly she's laying up there, when she sees me coming
and after five or more minutes, as she wishes she comes down to play,
what means bite my hands, jump on my back and shoulder hang over my head
and so on. Many people don't understand that I love this destructive
animal and they ask me why I don't bring it back in the wild.
I can't do so, because Babe is not afraid of people, but here in
Suriname most of the people are afraid of krapdagu's (The Surinamese
name for the crab-eating raccoon).
So when I bring her somewhere in the wild, it will be her death, because
when she meets people she will go to them and that would become fatal to
her. She instead will stay safe, she has a home with us forever.
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