{"id":336793,"date":"2026-07-11T10:04:11","date_gmt":"2026-07-11T10:04:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/336793\/"},"modified":"2026-07-11T10:04:11","modified_gmt":"2026-07-11T10:04:11","slug":"amid-southern-heat-wave-a-tallahassee-racoon-takes-a-birdbath","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/336793\/","title":{"rendered":"Amid southern heat wave, a Tallahassee racoon takes a birdbath"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a data-ylk=\"elm:icon;slk:USA TODAY;\" href=\"https:\/\/uw-media.usatoday.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\"><img alt=\"USA TODAY\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"174\" height=\"40\" decoding=\"async\" data-nimg=\"1\" class=\"pr-2.5 max-w-[150px] max-h-[40px] min-[601px]:max-w-[115px]\" style=\"color:transparent;max-width:auto;max-height:100%\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/https:\/\/s.yimg.com\/os\/creatr-uploaded-images\/2021-07\/506fdd20-ee43-11eb-8f33-8a4102cf7edb.jpeg\"\/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Arianna Otero, Tallahassee Democrat<\/p>\n<p>Sat, July 11, 2026 at 9:06 AM UTC<\/p>\n<p>Humans aren&#8217;t the only ones trying to <a data-ylk=\"slk:beat the Florida heat.;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.usatoday.com\/story\/news\/state\/florida\/2026\/07\/10\/south-florida-heat-advisory-weekend-forecast\/90873092007\/\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\" target=\"_blank\">beat the Florida heat.<\/a><\/p>\n<p>A local racoon decided the best way to relax would be taking a dip in William Shaner&#8217;s birdbath in his backyard.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Just cooling off on a hot day,&#8221; Shaner texted the Tallahassee Democrat.<\/p>\n<p>Shaner said he was visited by the critter around 5:30 p.m. on July 7, while he was listening to a World Cup soccer podcast at his home in Killearn Estates.<\/p>\n<p><img alt=\"William Shaner said he spotted a racoon taking a dip in his birdbath at his house along Tralee Road on July 7.\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"960\" height=\"640\" decoding=\"async\" data-nimg=\"1\" class=\"standard-img w-full w-full h-auto\" style=\"color:transparent\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/https:\/\/media.zenfs.com\/en\/aol_usatoday_us_articles_590\/f48fb2383eac7118e1b7992d65b2006b.jpeg\"\/><\/p>\n<p>William Shaner said he spotted a racoon taking a dip in his birdbath at his house along Tralee Road on July 7.<\/p>\n<p>He got the photo and video of the racoon splayed out in the bird bath.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I actually thought she\/he was going to take a drink after snacking on some birdseed, when she\/he settled down to cool off,&#8221; Shaner texted.<\/p>\n<p>The Southeast has been dealing with record temperatures, even experiencing a <a data-ylk=\"slk:heat dome;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.tallahassee.com\/story\/weather\/2026\/06\/29\/what-is-heat-dome-map-heat-wave-florida-forecast\/90735172007\/\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\" target=\"_blank\">heat dome<\/a> over the holiday weekend, but it looks like everyone is doing what they can to cool off or trying to at least.<\/p>\n<p>In Tallahassee, the <a data-ylk=\"slk:beloved Splash Pad;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.tallahassee.com\/story\/news\/local\/2026\/07\/01\/splash-pad-at-cascades-park-in-tallahassee-is-broken\/90745490007\/\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\" target=\"_blank\">beloved Splash Pad <\/a>has been down at Cascades Park so many are taking the racoon route, but subbing the birdbath for the pool.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We need something that makes us smile every morning,&#8221; Shaner said.<\/p>\n<p>Arianna Otero is the trending and breaking news reporter for the Tallahassee Democrat. Contact her via email at\u00a0<a data-ylk=\"slk:AOtero@tallahassee.com;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.aol.com\/articles\/mailto:AOtero@tallahassee.com\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">AOtero@tallahassee.com<\/a>\u00a0and follow her on X:\u00a0<a data-ylk=\"slk:@ari_v_otero;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas;\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/ari_v_otero\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\" target=\"_blank\">@ari_v_otero<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: <a data-ylk=\"slk:See a raccoon take a dip in a birdbath to beat Florida heat;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.tallahassee.com\/story\/news\/local\/2026\/07\/11\/see-a-raccoon-take-a-dip-in-a-birdbath-to-beat-florida-heat\/90876812007\/\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\" target=\"_blank\">See a raccoon take a dip in a birdbath to beat Florida heat<\/a><\/p>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Arianna Otero, Tallahassee Democrat Sat, July 11, 2026 at 9:06 AM UTC Humans aren&#8217;t the only ones trying&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":336794,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[138674,67985,232,1216,234,233,138673],"class_list":["post-336793","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tallahassee","tag-birdbath","tag-florida-heat","tag-tallahassee","tag-tallahassee-democrat","tag-tallahassee-headlines","tag-tallahassee-news","tag-william-shaner"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/336793","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=336793"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/336793\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/336794"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=336793"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=336793"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=336793"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}