Darn Raccoons, why do they have to be so cute!

Last year I bought a trap to catch our stupid Raccoon, but every morning I woke up looked out the window and the trap was sprung, but no Raccoon so I finally gave up. Yesterday I thought I would do a little tweaking to the trap and give it one more try and low and behold, I caught a Raccoon, unfortunately it was a baby Raccoon and its Mommy and sibling were frantic. Here he is right before I killed him.................................................just kidding!

Here is the mommy and other baby after I reluctantly let the baby out. I just couldn't do it, they are so cute and I felt so bad. They were watching from our tree when I let the baby out and apparently they didn't see where he ran which was on the other side of the pond. They spent a long time searching for him.

Now I feel bad, but I'm sure they will reunite soon. They just wreak havoc on my pond every night and they drag stuff all over the lawn. But I didn't realize it was a family, I thought it was just one ( I wasn't going to kill it, just relocate it). I guess we will just have to live with them.

Everything I have read about trapping Raccoons say that you need to euthanize them, that relocating is illegal and ultimately more cruel, but there is no way I could do it, I would have to take my chances and relocate them and hope they thrive. I don't see any way to catch all of them, so I am going to give up and just let them have at it.