On Mexico\u2019s Cozumel Island, young endangered pygmy raccoons were filmed pulling paper from a trash bin, soaking it, rolling it into balls, then batting and chasing them like soccer \u2014 behavior researchers say may be the first documented case of raccoons deliberately transforming material for non-food play, ZME Science reported of a study in the journal Wild.<\/p>\n
Miami University biologist Nessie O\u2019Neil and colleagues logged 64 hours of observation: 14 ball-making sequences, eight completed balls, and six play episodes. One juvenile performed the full routine; her sister watched, failed early attempts, then succeeded alone days later after the first was removed for care \u2014 likely learning by observation, not formal teaching. Two juvenile dwarf coatis even joined one play session. Raccoons about 30 kilometers away showed object play but no paper-ball making.<\/p>\n
The finding carries weight for a species with fewer than 200 mature individuals. Juvenile 1 later died in rehabilitative care, likely from malnutrition and human-derived toxins; researchers say unusual learned behaviors can vanish before scientists know how widespread they are.<\/p>\n
Sources:<\/strong> ZME Science<\/a>; Asia Business Daily<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Cozumel pygmy raccoons turn trash into toys in a possible first for the species<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":144,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-145","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/bugleblast.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/bb-raccoon-toys-0911.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugleblast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugleblast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugleblast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugleblast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugleblast.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=145"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bugleblast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugleblast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/144"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugleblast.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=145"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugleblast.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=145"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugleblast.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=145"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}