Settle down stlhead. Unless you've had to deal with coons, it's hard to understand how dangerous they can actually be. I have had both a dog and a cat attacked by them. The cat had its skin litterally stripped off its back leg from just above the thigh down to the foot. The Vet re-attached it but the leg was pretty much toast after that. The coons treed him and then gang attacked, they were not merely shooing him away from some slugs. Now that I have kids running around outside, any coon that approaches them will not be long for this world. The bacteria they pack in their claws is rather brutal and sure to cause infection and worse. They live in the sewers and drain fields and trash collection sites everywhere and are very dirty animals. I've seen them on Queen Anne hill at night in the middle of non-stop condo rows. I doubt SH is going to affect their longevity as a species.