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Identification chart

Animal droppings identification chart: Florida, North Carolina and South Carolina

Eleven kinds of droppings you can actually run into in Florida, North Carolina and South Carolina, each with a photo, a real size in inches, the contents you can see with the naked eye, and the animal people confuse it with. Pick where you found it and the chart narrows down.

Key takeaways
  • Size first, then the ends, then the contents. A hog dropping is as long as your hand, a rabbit pellet is smaller than a pea, and everything else sits between them.
  • Piles mean something. Raccoons, skunks, otters and bobcats reuse one spot, called a latrine. Opossums and deer drop wherever they are, which is why they are the hardest to pin down.
  • The place it was left is evidence too. Muskrat and otter droppings sit at the water line, squirrel pellets land on rails and logs, rat droppings show up indoors along a wall.
  • A raccoon latrine is a health matter, not just a mess. Roundworm eggs survive in soil for years, so never dry sweep or vacuum it: wet it, wear protection, then disinfect.
  • Read the droppings with the tracks. Two signs in the same place identify an animal more reliably than the best single photo ever will.

The chart

White-tailed deer droppings

White-tailed deer

Odocoileus virginianus
Pellets 0.5 to 0.8 in long
  • Oval pellets with a slight point and a dimple at one end, dark brown and glossy when fresh
  • In summer the pellets often come out as one clumped mass instead of separate pieces
  • Scattered over a trail or lawn, never in a latrine

Confused with: Rabbit pellets, which are rounder and about half the size, and much lighter in color

What to do: Old pellets crumble in a few weeks, so fresh ones tell you the animal is currently working the garden

Photo: mpelikan, CC BY 4.0
Bobcat droppings

Bobcat

Lynx rufus
2 to 4 in long, about 0.75 to 1 in thick
  • Segmented, with clear constrictions between the sections and tapered ends
  • Full of hair and small bone fragments, and often left on a trail, a log or a rock and then scratched at
  • Smells like a cat latrine, not like a dog

Confused with: The domestic cat, which leaves the same shape at roughly half the size, and the coyote, whose scat is smoother and rarely segmented

What to do: Scat left out in the open and scratched at is scent marking, not a latrine, which means the animal is claiming the route

Photo: garth_harwood, CC BY 4.0
Raccoon droppings

Raccoon

Procyon lotor
2 to 3 in long, 0.75 in thick
  • Tubular with blunt ends, often the same thickness for most of its length
  • Deposited in a pile: a latrine used by the same animal for months, on a roof, a log, a woodpile or in an attic corner
  • You can usually see seeds, berry skins and insect parts in it

Confused with: The opossum, whose scat is more irregular and often softer, and the skunk, which is smaller and broken into pieces

What to do: A latrine on a roof or in an attic is the sign that pairs with a real health risk: never dry sweep it, wet it and wear a respirator

Photo: eric-schmitty, CC BY 4.0
Gray fox droppings

Gray fox

Urocyon cinereoargenteus
2 to 3.5 in long
  • Twisted and tapered at the ends, usually thinner than a raccoon dropping
  • Seeds and hair are obvious, and it is often left on a rock, a stump or a path rather than buried
  • Frequently in the same place twice, which is what makes it easy to find

Confused with: The bobcat, whose scat is segmented rather than twisted, and the coyote, which is larger

What to do: Fox scat near a den site means pups in spring, so keep dogs away until they move on

Photo: garth_harwood, CC BY 4.0
Eastern cottontail droppings

Eastern cottontail

Sylvilagus floridanus
Pellets 0.3 to 0.5 in
  • Round, light brown pellets, usually in loose groups on grass or a lawn edge
  • They are firm and dry, and they do not stick together the way deer pellets can
  • Often found near the same clipping damage: stems cut at an angle

Confused with: Deer pellets, which are twice the size and oval rather than round

What to do: Pellets plus 45 degree cuts on stems mean browsing, and fencing is the fix that works

Photo: brycetheplant, CC BY 4.0
River otter droppings

River otter

Lontra canadensis
2 to 4 in long
  • Left in piles on a rock, a log or a bank ledge right at the water line
  • You can see fish scales, shells and bones in it, and it smells strongly of fish
  • Often beside a slide or a worn path down to the water

Confused with: The mink, which leaves a similar scat at a smaller size, and the raccoon, which is rarely this close to open water

What to do: A stocked pond with otter scat and slides is losing fish: exclude the pond rather than trap the animal

Photo: garth_harwood, CC BY 4.0
Feral hog droppings

Feral hog

Sus scrofa
4 to 6 in long
  • Large, soft, dark piles that break apart into segmented lumps
  • Deposited in groups where the animals have been feeding, together with rooted soil
  • Color and texture change with the diet, so shape matters more than color

Confused with: Nothing native leaves scat this large: if it looks like a small dog left it and the ground around it is rooted, it is a hog

What to do: Feral hogs are regulated as an invasive species: report the sign to the state agency rather than dealing with it yourself

Photo: max_carabus, CC BY 4.0
Muskrat droppings

Muskrat

Ondatra zibethicus
0.5 to 1 in
  • Small oval pieces, greenish brown when fresh, left in piles
  • Deposited on a feeding platform, a flat rock or a stump at the water edge
  • Usually surrounded by cut stems and chewed roots

Confused with: The Norway rat, which leaves the same size of dropping inside buildings and around bins rather than at the water

What to do: Bank burrows are the expensive part: they undermine pond edges and dock footings, so find them early

Striped skunk droppings

Striped skunk

Mephitis mephitis
1 to 2 in long
  • Tubular and blunt, often broken into short pieces, and usually not in a tidy pile
  • Insect parts, seeds and bits of shell are often visible in it
  • Found at the den entrance or along a regular route rather than in a latrine

Confused with: The raccoon, which is larger, smoother and piles it up in one place

What to do: Scat at a den entrance under a porch or shed tells you where to exclude, and where to check before you seal

Photo: milliebasden, CC BY 4.0
Beaver droppings

Beaver

Castor canadensis
Pellets about 0.8 in long
  • Oval pieces, sometimes with a groove down one side, left on mud at the water edge
  • Often a few pieces floating in the shallows next to the pile
  • Found near cut stems, peeled sticks and the dam itself

Confused with: Muskrat droppings, which are smaller and greener, and deer pellets, which are found away from water

What to do: Droppings near a dam confirm the animal is active, which matters before you install a flow device

Opossum droppings

Opossum

Didelphis virginiana
3 to 5 in long
  • Irregular tubular pieces, often broken, with a blunt end and no constrictions
  • Seeds, insect fragments and sometimes shiny beetle cases inside
  • Left wherever the animal happened to be, not in a latrine or a pile

Confused with: The raccoon, whose scat is smoother, thicker and used in a latrine

What to do: Because it is dropped at random, an opossum dropping in an attic is easy to confuse with a rat problem: check the size before you buy traps

How I read a dropping

There are five things worth looking at, and you can do all of them without touching anything. Photograph it next to a coin or a bank card first, because the measurement is what you will need later.

  1. Length and thickness. This is the fastest filter. Anything four inches or more points at hog, beaver or otter rather than a yard animal.
  2. The ends. Blunt ends mean raccoon or skunk, tapered ends with a twist mean fox, and segments with visible constrictions mean cat.
  3. Contents. Seeds, berry skins, insect parts and shell mean a mixed diet. Hair and bone mean a predator. Fish scales and bones with a strong fishy smell mean otter or mink, at the water.
  4. Shape of a pellet. Round is rabbit, oval with a dimple is deer, small and dark is squirrel or rat.
  5. Where it was left. A latrine on a roof or a woodpile, a pile of pellets on a rock at the water, single pellets on a lawn, or a line of blunt droppings inside along a wall.

The honest limit is worth saying out loud: raccoon, opossum and skunk overlap enough that shape alone will not always settle it. That is why every card here also tells you what to do next, and why the tracks are the better second sign when the droppings are fresh and small.

More signs in the same series: the animal droppings chart and the snake shed skin guide, both built the same way. If you would rather answer two questions and get the shortlist, the what did I find tool does that. These charts cover Florida, North Carolina and South Carolina, while the operator directory covers six states: Florida, North Carolina and South Carolina, Indiana, Louisiana and Virginia.

Cleaning up without making it worse

Droppings indoors or in an attic: wet it down, do not sweep it
  • Never dry sweep or vacuum. That is how roundworm eggs and fungal spores end up in the air you breathe.
  • Wet the material first with a spray bottle, then pick it up with disposable gloves and a bag.
  • Wear an N95 or better, plus eye protection, and keep anyone pregnant, immunocompromised or under five out of the room entirely.
  • Disinfect the surface afterwards, then wash your hands, your clothes and anything the bag touched.
  • Call a professional for a raccoon latrine in an attic. A large pile soaked into insulation is a remediation job, not a cleaning job.

For the specific messes, I keep the step by step versions in the guide to cleaning raccoon droppings safely and in the bat guano cleanup guide, which is the one to read before you touch anything in an attic where bats have been roosting.

Once the mess is gone, the same signs tell you whether the animal is still using the space. Fresh droppings the next morning mean the entry is still open, and closing it is the only fix that lasts. My guide to raccoon tracks in a backyard covers how to read the route that leads to it.

The raccoon leaves tubular, blunt-ended droppings about the thickness of a marker in one place over and over, and that pile is called a latrine. The opossum leaves irregular pieces wherever it happens to be, often softer and more broken up, and never builds up a pile in one spot. If there is a latrine on a roof, a woodpile or in a corner of an attic, it is almost always a raccoon, and that is also the sign that carries the roundworm risk I wrote about in the <a href="/raccoon-poop-identification-vs-other-animal-droppings/">raccoon poop guide</a>.