Introduction

Raccoons are such cute animals. You may or may not have encountered them in your life, but nonetheless they are quite familiar to us, as can be seen in the following raccoon-related products in Korea.

But there is something you must know before moving on to our contents.

Raccons, as shown in the 너구리 라면, are a whole different species from the ones we see in our country. Those that inhabit in Korea are called raccoon dogs, rather than just raccoon.

They look quite similar, which is why the raccoon dog has the word "raccoon" in its name, but in fact they are not even in the same families. Under the Carnivore, raccoons have their own category, while raccoon dogs are placed under cats and dogs category.

In addition, raccoon dogs resemble dogs with relatively shorter muzzles compared to raccoons', and unlike raccoons, they don’t have loop patterns on their tails.

As for their primary habitats, raccoons live in North America, and raccoon dogs inhabit mostly in East Asia, as shown in the map.

Observation

Raccoon dogs are very difficult to find because they are nocturnal animals.

So, we did a survey among 40 fellow students at KAIST to see where they are seen most frequently.

19 students replied to our survey and said that they were seen in these respective areas.

1. Undergraduate soccer field,

 2. Educational support building,

3. The tennis court,

4. Endless road, and lastly,

5. Near the campus police office. 

This shows the locations of raccoon dogs observations.

Yellow arrows indicate the locations where our team observed the raccoon dogs.

The violet arrows are showing the locations of other students observations.

And cross sign is for the raod-killed raccoon dog.

And we find calculate the kaist raccoon dog's range of activity (red line).

But it is bigger than usual raccoon dog's range of activity.

It is possible that there are two groups of raccoon dogs in KAIST.

This video clip is for the raccoon dog we observed.

And these pictures are for the raccoon dogs we observed.

Interesting Natures

The first interesting natrue of raccoon dog is playing dead.

Unfortunately, we did not observe it.

The raccoon dogs meet people usually, they may not think we are the predators.



When we observed the raccoon dog firstly, he or she looked alone.

But an our team member found other raccoon dog nearly to the raccoon dog.

The raccoon dogs forage individually but they move to other location together.

And thier group is a family.

The raccoon dogs are nocturnal; they are awaken during night.

So we moved around KAIST campus at night.

A team member observed the raccoon dogs on 4 a.m.

The raccoon dog hibernates.

Interestingly the raccoon dog is only one species in the dog family.

The raccoon dog is known to go into hibernation in November,

but it has been observed until last weekend of November,

so it seems that there must be something that causes it to shift its annual clock.

Perhaps global warming? Or enough food?

If you want to observe the raccoon dog, you can use tin foil.

The raccoon dog loves to collect shiny objects.

We found the nest of the raccoon dogs with many shiny cans.

Yawning behavior

The above raccoon, not raccoon dog, is yawning.

And we observed that the raccoon dog yawned.

So we make three hypothesis about why the raccoon dogs yawn.

Before we observed yawn of the raccoon dog, it had aten a can tuna.

So we thought it could be a drowsiness after meal ("식곤증").

By comparing the frequency of yawn before and after meal,

we can prove this hypothesis.

When you yawn, you may think that you are sleepy.

So we make the second hypothesis that the raccoon dogs yawn to refresh their brain.

We can prove it by comparing the yawn frequency following the ration of oxygen.

Less oxygen may cause more yawns.

The baboon yawn to threat enemy.

It is possible to raccoon dog also; the yawning of raccoon dog is sign of warning.

If we compare the frequency of yawns with and without human watching,

we can prove this hypothesis.



Competitive Behavior

A very interesting thing that happened during our observation was the interaction between the raccoon dog and the cat. The raccoon dog and a couple of cats seem to be inhabiting in the same area, and while we were trying to feed the raccoon dog some tuna, the cats almost always came to intercept the food.

 This video clip, though it is more of an audio clip, is a footage we took while observing their interaction. We put a tuna can in the area where both the raccoon dog and the cat live, the cat approached the tuna can first. The squeaking sound in the clip is the sound made by the raccoon dog when it approached the tuna-eating cat from behind and threatened the cat to run off in order to claim its food. Right after the sound was made, the cat did run away and the raccoon dog took the can all by itself. An interesting thing to note here is that when we repeated the experiment, the raccoon dog continually let the cat approach the can first; even though it seemed to clearly know that it is food.

Then our question is, why does the raccoon dog let the cat approach the food first?

 

Our first hypothesis is that the raccoon dog is testing to see if the food is edible.

In order to test this hypothesis, we can set up an experiment where the raccoon dog is positioned to watch the cat approach a poisoned food first, and see if the raccoon dog still eats the food even after seeing the cat vomiting because of the poison. If the raccoon dog retrains from taking to food, then the hypothesis gains some credibility.

 

The second hypothesis is that the cat approaches the food first because it can smell better. To test this, we can put food in equal distance to the raccoon dog and the cat, of course both of them blindfolded. With varying distance from the food, we can measure their olfactory capability. If the cat indeed can smell better than the raccoon dog, it will be able to detect food that the raccoon dog cannot. Therefore, the raccoon dog will become more dependent on the cat.

 

The relationship between the raccoon dog and the cat in our school seems to be something of a mutualism. They seem to fight against each other sometimes, but they also seem to be helpful to each other to some extent, and it might even be possible that they are exhibiting playful behavior toward each other.

Auditory Response

While we were observing the raccoon dog, we noticed that it responded to different sounds differently. The raccoon dog was exposed to many different kinds of sounds, including the sound of a bicycle rolling by, a plastic bag cackling, a motorcycle engine sound, and a tuna can clanking on the ground. To these various sounds the raccoon dog responded only to some, by looking up, and to others it did not pay any attention.

 So we made a question about this behavior: why does the raccoon dog respond to certain sounds and not to others?

Our first hypothesis is that some sounds are related to food. Such as the crumpling sound of the plastic bag or the sound of aluminum foil may have led the raccoon to relate the sounds to food source. Perhaps, life in KAIST may have caused to raccoon to display learned behavior.

 

The test to this is by comparing the behavior of KAIST raccoon dog and a wild raccoon dog that has not been exposed to human food sources. If the wild dog also responds to the sounds of plastic bags and can clinging as much as it responds to bicycle or motorcycle noises, then our hypothesis will be proved correct à the raccoon is displaying learned behavior

 

Our second hypothesis is that the raccoon dog responds to sounds that it considers more threatening. However this hypothesis is not convincing in that usually sounds of motorcycles are more threatening than the sound of plastic bags.

However, if you remember the raccoon dog that was road killed- the location was in front of 정문술 building where there are a lot of cars and motorcycles. Perhaps, the raccoon dog is insensitive to motorcycle sounds.

 

Our last hypothesis is that the raccoon dog responds to different sounds in its audible frequency range, and responds sensitively to some frequencies. For example, fire alarms or the horn clanking of cars are designed to alert humans for maximum attention in frequencies we are most sensitive to.

 

Perhaps for raccoons, these high pitched frequencies are their most sensitive areas. So, for this hypothesis, we designed two experiments.

 

First, we can use the AEPs (Auditory evoked potentials) method which allows us to represent the response in the brain according to sounds in different frequencies by recording the very small electrical voltage potentials originating from the brain and recorded from the scalp in response to auditory response.

 

This is the usual auditory pathway of a raccoon dog which is similar to dogs. Through following the pathway of the auditory response to the last step, recognition and response from the cortex of the brain, we can observe the intensity of the raccoon dog’s response to different frequencies.

Then we can take the above procedure to obtain the information about the neural patterns of the raccon dog's brain in response to certain sounds.

Another experiment would be a behavior test, which checks the audible range of the raccoon dog. By exposing the raccoon dog to sounds of different frequency, we can see how it responds to certain frequencies.

Conclusion

In our neighboring country, Japan is sick from fever. Raccoon dog fever! Raccoon dogs are called Tanuki and they are known as very mysterious and humorous creatures in tales. Raccoon dogs are loved in animations and are also grown at homes as cute pets. They can even be toilet trained. We shouldn’t’t be so scared about raccoon dogs when we meet them in campus. We noticed that a lot of students in KAIST are afraid of raccoons but like dogs, they are very friendly(?) neighbors in campus.

However, raccoon dogs are not always so lucky.

Raccoon dogs are often captured and skinned alive for the fur.

People strip off their fur while the raccoon dogs are still alive in order to reduce the damage to their fur. The raccoon dogs are reported to stay alive for even ten minutes after being skinned, with their heart still beating.

Is it really necessary to have such luxury items at the price of such cruelty? We should have more sympathy and be nice to our friendly neighbors, the raccoon dog.