And you thought only felines purred! Poor,
jaded person that you are - let it be known to you that raccoons too purr.
Yes, these cute food-washing creatures exhibit a purring means of communication. It differs from cat purring in that racoon purring is more acoustic than tactile. Cat purring functions mainly in a vibrational way - you can feel a cut purr as it presses against you, and kittens purr against their mothers. A raccoon purr is more involved with sound than vibration.
Another difference is that a raccoon's purr is audible only on exhaling, wheras a cat can purr continously.
Baby raccoons tend to purr more, and the purring's association with contentment might arise form the fact that raccoon babies tend to purr a lot when suckling, and this association may linger till adulthood, when raccoons will purr right after meals.
Many digital .wav files of raccoon purring can be found around the net. However they may be misleading in that they might sound a little like growls, whereas one would never confuse a gentle racoon purr with a growl in real life.