New Study Suggests Racoons are Showing First Signs of Domestication

A new study suggests that raccoons living in cities and suburbs are undergoing very early, subtle changes in both body shape and behavior that match those seen in the first stages of domestication in other species, mainly driven by easy access to human food and reduced fear of people.

Researchers stress that “trash pandas” are not yet domesticated pets, but urban populations are showing traits that suggest the domestication process may be beginning. And, apparently, trash may be at the root of this development.

The study lays out the case that the domestication process is often wrongly thought of as initiated by humans—with people capturing and selectively breeding wild animals. But the study authors claim that the process begins much earlier, when animals become habituated to human environments.

“One thing about us humans is that, wherever we go, we produce a lot of trash,” says the study’s co-author and University of Arkansas at Little Rock biologist Raffaela Lesch. Piles of human scraps offer a bottomless buffet to wildlife, and to access that bounty, animals need to be bold enough to rummage through human rubbish but not so bold as to become a threat to people. “If you have an animal that lives close to humans, you have to be well-behaved enough,” Lesch says. “That selection pressure is quite intense.”...