Harbor the Blind Raccoon: Neglect Took His Sight, but Not His Spirit
To watch Harbor the raccoon playing in a tub of water, eating a pumpkin, or walking with his handler on a lead through the fragrant grass, it’s hard to imagine that this ecstatic creature had ever gone through so much hell. Harbor’s story, though inspirational, is also a cautionary tale: unless one is a wildlife rehabilitator with previous raccoon experience, the charming bandit-faced babies do not grow up to make good pets.
Harbor is about 80 percent blind, a result of years of malnutrition while he languished from neglect in a filthy two-by-two cage that reeked of urine, feces and rotted food in the dark cabin of a boat overflowing with garbage. The boat had become a health hazard, Care2 reports, and when the authorities were called to investigate, they discovered Harbor.
The man who imprisoned Harbor found the cute baby coon was “too much to manage” when he hit adulthood, so he locked Harbor up for four years. Authorities at the marina soon called Mary Cummins of Los Angeles-based Animal Advocates.
Laura Simpson, Harbor’s permanent caretaker, recalls the rescue:
Mary rushed the raccoon to the vet where they determined that he was 80% blind due to poor nutrition, no sunlight and fumes from the accumulated feces and urine. She then turned him over to me, also a rehabilitator, for evaluation for eventual release. I soon found that due to his blindness and other issues caused by his long captivity, a life in the wild would not possible for him.
I named him Harbor, and quickly found that despite his hardships, he was a sweet and gentle soul. His yearning for contact and attention was palpable. After a few days and a few baths and lots of love and reassurance, I released him into a large enclosure that I had custom-built for him.
The wonderful video Simpson has taken of Harbor tells the rest of the story. As Simpson told Care2, she is astounded by Harbor’s “utterly incredible capacity for joy” and sees her new friend as a reminder that “we do not have to carry our darkness with us and that every day is a gift.”
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