How Are Raccoons Not Incredibly Sick All the Time?

I don’t claim to have a healthy diet. If I kept a food diary, it would double as a confession — a decision I pay the price for full well in the water closet. My stomach and brain have a tenuous, but workable relationship, which sometimes results in bathroom visits that approach a sprint. This is all with me eating what is, at least in theory, perfectly edible food. It may not leave me feeling particularly spry, but it does keep me alive.

Raccoons, on the other hand? I’m constantly in awe of their agility and energy levels, given that they eat actual, literal trash. I eat a big plate of halal food, and I’m not moving for at least two hours, but they’re eating a day-old pile of it off the street and can still sprint to safety at a moment’s notice? I feel like every raccoon we see should look deathly ill, purely based on their diet. 

So what’s going on? Just purely an iron stomach? Do they, in fact, feel like shit but just hide it well?

Apparently, their continued, shocking gut health isn’t necessarily biological, which does make some sense, as they weren’t always trash-hounds. They added trash to their repertoire when we started producing it en masse. 

Nor is their foraging in your local garbage bin nearly as chaotic as it seems. They’re incredibly intelligent animals, with dextrous little fingers, and seem to have a pretty good idea of what's going to make them sick. When you see your trash can shaking, that’s not a raccoon going on a blind trash-eating binge, but them actually evaluating and sorting the contents for items that certainly aren’t in top condition, but are entirely edible. 

Which, to me, only makes them more endearing. I can imagine one now, taking a bite of stale bread and delivering a Flintstones-worthy, “It’s a living.”