Dear raccoons: your time of ravaging Torontonians' garbage bins and leaving waste all over their yards may be reaching its end.
The city is in the process of obtaining new green bins that are more resistant to the scavenging critters than previous iterations. It released a video Thursday showing just how well they work.
The video shows a raccoon having little trouble entering a green bin and stealing the scraps inside. It then demonstrates the difficulty the creatures have with a new bin that has been designed with an animal-resistant latch by the Rehrig Pacific Company.
Eventually, they give up.
The "next generation" bins, which are being produced as part of a contract worth just over $31 million, have been recommended by city staff and were set to be voted on by the public works committee on Thursday, said The Toronto Star. The bins will be made available to city residents next year, if they're approved.
And the city's mayor, for one, seems to take it pretty personally.
"We have left no stone unturned in our fight against the Raccoon Nation," Mayor John Tory said at an announcement. "Defeat is not an option."
Research by York University professor Suzanne MacDonald, who assisted with testing these new bins, has found that raccoons living in urban areas are more resourceful than creatures that live in rural areas, National Geographic reported last year.
They deal with features they don't experience in more natural areas, such as traffic, and looking for food and water in swimming pools and waste bins.
The new bins certainly look like they could present a challenge for the troublesome critters.
So for now: green bins — 1; raccoons — zero.
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