Based on distance you plan to shoot, the Trail NP .22 or the .25 Marauder will do the job. The farther away you get, the more critical shot placement and type of pellet become. Raccoon have a decently thick skull, especially when shooting them between the eyes. I've had 38 grain Remington .22 subsonic hollow points traveling at 940 fps (5 inch barrel) not penetrate the skull at 3 ft with the "between the eyes" shot. I've also put down more than a few raccoon with the .22 NP and .25 Marauder as our laws require dispatch of "nuisance" raccoon. These dispatch shots have been head shots taken from several inches to 10+ yards. For raccoon that have not been confined, the longest shot I've taken is 35 yards with a .22 RWS 34 (lung shot) when it was in a tree and I've made multiple "tree" shots from 10 - 30 yards with the .22 NP successfully.
When I tested the poly mag on a 5 lb clay block at 22 yards using a .22 NP2 it gave me a wound channel that was 0.450" wide and 1.293" deep. I've tried dispatching raccoon at point blank range with head shots using poly mags in the .22 NP, .22 NP2, and .22 Marauder Pistol and in more than 50% of the tests (85%+ with the PRod), the raccoon required a follow up shot unless the shot was at the back of the skull. Doing the clay testing with a JSB diabolo gave me a wound channel of 0.263" with a depth of 2.389 inches. During the dispatch testing, no follow up shots were required for point blank range head shots with the diabolo pellets regardless of shot placement. The same testing (5 lb clay block at 22 yards) with the .25 Marauder resulted in the poly mags giving a wound channel of 0.656 with a depth of 1.950" and for the JSB Exact King diabolo the wound channel was 0.283" and the depth was 2.869". I've done limited dispatch testing with the .25 Marauder, but to date all point blank range shots have 100% success regardless of pellet. While these results do show the .25 is the more powerful of the two (which comes as no surprise), it also shows that neither of the calibers match up to a Remington .22 subsonic producing 72.68 fpe at the pistol's muzzle and its down range energy.
Due to the potential for the pellet retaining the maximum amount of it's energy is why I recommend raccoon head shots be taken only with diabolo pellets unless you are shooting in an area where you can quickly walk to the animal for a point blank follow up shot if necessary. If you decide to use the poly mag or another type of hollow point, try to limit yourself to side of head or back of skull head shots for best results. In terms of distance, I'd recommend not doing a head shot past 20 yards with the .22 NP and not past 35 yards with the .25 Marauder.
When the raccoon is in a tree, I've had good success with the heart/lung shot with both diabolo and hollow point pellet types but now prefer the poly mag/hollow point for the extra trauma (even through it isn't much more than the diabolo pellet, it is more) as it seems to speed up the dispatch process. I say "seems" because I've never actually timed the difference so I can't say if this is true or not. What I like about this shot is that the raccoon tends to "hug" the tree staying in place for the most part until it looses enough blood that it can no long maintain it's hold then falls to the ground. I have had an issue twice with the .22 NP using hollow points where the first shot must have just clipped the lungs so I wasn't getting the internal bleeding I was hoping for and had to do a second shot which resulted in the coon moving around and higher into the tree. I bring this up because I had a case where the raccoon could have dropped to the ground and attempted to run off as it was only 6 or 10 feet up but luckily for me it didn't.
Keep in mind that these results are specific to my experience and testing of my equipment so it may be different for you, but hopefully this will give you some help.
Eric
