Pay no attention to that fearsome lolcoon up there; raccoons are really, really cute when they're not rabid, or scattering your trash all over your driveway, or snacking on ¥164 million in crops across the whole country. (These are NOT tanuki, "raccoon dogs," which are also cute, but about as closely related to North American raccoons as that amusing schoolyard ball-swinging song is to the tune from which it derives. ...Now I wish I knew more American Baptist hymns. Oh, tanuki balls, is there anything you can't do? Those of you scratching your heads, go read that Wiki.)

Ironically, the raccoons ransacking Japan's crops are indeed North American Procyon Iotor, otherwise known to non-city-dwellers as "Awww, look...HEY, QUIT IT!" through the kitchen windows. In the late 70s, when a show I assume to be this one was extremely popular in Japan, folks over there started importing these cute fluffernuts by the truckload, up to 1,500 a year at peak. Amazingly (read: as people always do when they acquire a popular item more animate than a stuffed Hello Kitty), lots of pet coons were soon dumped, or turned loose, or escaped, and they set about earning themselves the Plenty Of The Little Bastards ranking on wildlife conservation lists. They now live in 36 prefectures, and a government ban on importing them or keeping 'em as pets is too little, too late