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Man Who Left Rabid Raccoon At Pinellas Shelter Identified

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By STEPHEN THOMPSON

The Tampa Tribune

Published: June 18, 2008

LARGO - The person who unwittingly dropped off a rabid raccoon at the Pinellas County animal services center in March came forward Tuesday, hours after Pinellas County authorities urged him to.

The man wishes to remain anonymous, said Mary Burrell, a Pinellas County government spokeswoman.

On March 23, a Sunday, he left the raccoon in the drop-off cage at the Pinellas County Animal Services complex on Ulmerton Road. On Monday, animal services officials received word the raccoon tested positive for rabies.

When a rabid raccoon turns up, Pinellas County Animal Services typically targets its habitat with an aggressive vaccine program. The agency couldn't do that in this case because authorities didn't know where the animal was found. That's why they issued a plea Tuesday morning for the person who dropped the animal off to contact them.

The man who dropped off the raccoon has told authorities he found the animal in his backyard, which is in a neighborhood off Keene Road in Clearwater, and trapped it using food, Burrell said. Now animal control workers will drop a couple hundred of the square vaccine baits in the area, she said.

It is not recommended that anyone try to trap a raccoon, because the animal may bite, Burrell said. Instead, contact animal services to do the job, she said.

"The last reported rabies case in Pinellas County was in 2005," Welch Agnew, director of animal services, said in a statement. "We have a rabies baiting program that very successfully controls rabies in our county, but we don't assume that it has been eradicated.

"When we have a case such as this one, we respond by aggressively treating the area where the raccoon was found."

The county's animal services division usually tests for rabies if a human or pet has been bitten or scratched. Those results are returned in one day. This raccoon was tested by the U.S. Department of Agriculture as part of its field testing program.

The bait Pinellas distributes is laced with a rabies vaccine. The bait program usually targets areas in northeastern and northern Pinellas, where most cases occur.

Reporter Stephen Thompson can be reached at (727) 451-2336 or spthompson@tampatrib.com.

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