Safely Remove Raccoons from Your Attic
As forests are replaced by residential and commercial developments and the climate changes, raccoons find themselves without a home in their preferred environment. They are forced into areas with houses, buildings, schools, shopping centers, and restaurants. Trees for denning are in local parks, neighborhoods, and on your property.
Raccoons quickly adjust to urban lifestyles, however. Their goal, no matter where they are, is to find food, water, and shelter. They will likely try to enter your attic for shelter if they can find food sources near your home.
Raccoons do not go into total hibernation during winter. Instead, they eat as much as possible to add fat that will act as food reserves during colder months. If they choose your attic for a den, you may find them in a state of torpor or dormancy if the temperature drops below 15 degrees. In torpor, they sleep for weeks before leaving to search for food.
Raccoons are nocturnal, meaning they are most active at night. If you see one, you will recognize it by its black mask across its eyes, pointed nose, and striped, bushy tail. Don’t let its cute, bandit-like appearance fool you. Raccoons can harm your health and your home.
How Do Raccoons Get In?
Raccoons are clever and have an abundance of confidence. If they see a small crack or hole anywhere in your home, they will make it bigger. You may think raccoons need large holes to enter, but they don’t. They can fit their bodies through a hole the size of a softball.
If your shingles have separated, they will rip them off to make a hole in your roof. Broken vent caps, open chimneys, broken attic windows, and doors that do not close are a raccoon’s opportunity to get inside.
Raccoons have dexterous hands, like human hands, but with strong claws. They can climb chimneys, trees, and siding. They can rip, tear, and shred various materials to create an entry. They may also choose easier ways to get into your home, like turning the doorknob or pushing open the pet door. If they smell food, they will go after it.
Problems Raccoons in Attic Cause
Raccoons damage many things simply trying to get into the attic, from landscaping to shingles. Once inside your attic, a new level of destruction begins. Some damage creates hazards for your home, and others threaten the physical health of you and your family.
Property Damage
Outside your attic, raccoons create holes in your roof by expanding pre-existing cracks or by creating new ones. Each time it rains, your attic will experience water damage. Raccoons will remove caps and vents, destroy shingles, and tear off gutters, siding, soffits, and fascia. Each of these damages allows additional wildlife species to enter your attic.
Raccoons tend to notice exposed wires in attics. They chew and scratch them, putting your home at high risk for fire. Raccoons use whatever they can find to make a nest, including scraps of drywall, items stored in boxes, and insulation. These items make great kindling if a spark flows from the damaged wires.
Exposed and covered beams and boards in your attic are attractive to raccoons that want to chew and gnaw on something. Doing so can make the structure of your home unstable. They may even chew through the flooring and the ceiling of the rooms below them.
Expect to see air conditioning and heating ducts torn apart inside the attic. Raccoons crawl through insulation, shred it in places, and even remove it to make a nest. You will quickly notice an insulation or duct problem. Your utility bill will increase, but your ability to stay warm or cool will decrease.
Damaged ductwork means the air will not flow properly through your home. What will flow, however, is the horrible smell of feces and urine. Raccoons create a unique area called a latrine, where they leave their feces and urine.
Health Risks from Raccoon Feces and Urine
Raccoon feces is a source of pathogens that can cause human illness if inhaled. Feces grow mold, and if the mold spores are ingested, humans may experience respiratory problems. Raccoon feces smell bad to humans but are an attractant to insects and other raccoons.
Spread of Disease
Raccoons may carry infectious diseases that can be given to pets and humans who encounter feces, urine, saliva, and other bodily fluids. These encounters may include disturbing a pile of feces, scratches, or bites.
Diseases most associated with raccoons include rabies. Roundworms, parasites found on raccoons, specifically affect a person’s central nervous system. Giardia, leptospirosis, and salmonella are other diseases transmitted by raccoons.
Signs a Raccoon Is in Your Attic
The more apparent signs of raccoon activity in your attic are the noises they make, which include more than 200 sounds. Raccoon sounds include hissing, purring, whistling, growling, chittering, screaming, squealing, and barking.
You may also hear them scratching, shuffling, and moving around in the attic. If you hear multiple raccoons, it could be a mother and her babies nesting in your attic. Most female raccoons give birth in late Spring or early Summer. They give birth once a year; the litter typically consists of less than four kits.
Outdoor signs that may mean a raccoon is living in your attic include foot tracks in the dirt. Their hands and feet are unique and easy to distinguish. Raccoons travel out of the attic at night, looking for food. You may have a raccoon tenant if you find an opened garbage can, scattered trash, stolen pet food, missing chickens, or raided gardens.urine. Finding these is a clue to start thinking about removing a raccoon from your attic.
How to Remove Raccoons from Your Attic
You may have heard of the do-it-yourself methods to remove a raccoon from your attic. Examples include placing strong-smelling products in the path of a raccoon, such as ammonia, apple cider vinegar, garlic, cayenne pepper, or blood meal. Use motion or sound-activated products that scare raccoons. Unfortunately, raccoons are clever, and repellants and deterrents are only temporary fixes. Raccoons get used to them and adapt quickly.
You may even try to trap a raccoon but quickly find you’ve been outsmarted or that using the wrong bait doesn’t work. If a female raccoon has recently given birth, you must figure out how to keep the family together. Finally, if you don’t make permanent changes, raccoons will return to your attic.
For many reasons, hiring a professional is the best option for raccoons in attic removal. They have the following:
- Safe and humane live traps and correct bait.
- One-way doors where traps aren’t needed.
- Extensive education and experience.
- Understanding of laws and regulations.
- Licenses, certifications, and permits.
While you enjoy your home, professionals will clean latrines and apply sanitization to the area, repair minor damages, and implement exclusions techniques to prevent future raccoon problems. Examples of exclusions include removing or protecting food sources, such as bird feeders and gardens. Experts also focus on sealing entries into your home, trimming or removing trees, installing climbing barriers to outdoor structures and trees, and properly storing livestock or pet feed.
Most importantly, professionals know how to get rid of raccoons in an attic quickly while also improving your property. Contact an expert when you see signs of a raccoon in your attic.