This video segment from Nature: "Raccoon Nation" highlights how a cartoon inadvertently led to the modern-day problems posed by raccoons in Japan. The segment describes how people, after seeing the cartoon Rascal the Raccoon, decided to adopt raccoons as pets and then, after seeing how violent and destructive they could be, released them into the wild. This led to the release of thousands of raccoons into forested areas of Japan, near sacred shrines and temples. The segment describes the damage that raccoons have caused to more than 80% of Japan's temples, and efforts to solve this problem.

This video is available in both English and Spanish audio, along with corresponding closed captions.