Having raccoons enter your home can be a real pain. Like most animals, they are looking for food and shelter in one location. Leaving food out or a mess around your home will attract the raccoons to your home. Once they get to your home, they will be looking to create a nice shelter for themselves. If you have any openings in your attic the raccoons will find their way in. It is imperative that you evict them as soon as possible. Curious about how to get rid of raccoons in an attic? Trapping, habitat changes, and the use of repellents are a few ways to get raccoons out of your attic.
Let’s take a look below at some more details regarding raccoons.
What Are Raccoons?
Identifying a raccoon can be fairly easy. However, some homeowners might confuse a raccoon for a skunk or an opossum. Either way, you will want these creatures out of your home. Raccoons have a thick coat of fur that is black, brown, or blonde. Also, they have busy tails that are long and have a ringed color design on them. Once you see a black mask around the eyes, you can tell it is a raccoon.
How Do I Keep Raccoons Away?
Keeping raccoons away is as simple as keeping other animals away from your home. Let’s take a look below at some recommendations for keeping raccoons away from your home.
- Motion-activated sprinkler systems – These systems are meant to kick on when motion is detected in the yard. The spraying of the sprinkler onto the raccoon will chase it off.
- Music – Utilize an outdoor radio that will change sounds from music to commercials. This variation in noise will confuse the raccoon and make it more weary of the area.
- Keep food stored – Always secure pet food and human food. Keeping these items locked up and stored will keep the raccoon from coming back. If they cannot find your food, then they will have to travel elsewhere to get it.
- Yard maintenance – Always clean up and tidy your landscaping and keep the grass cut. Also, do not leave piles of wood, leaves, or other debris lying around so that the raccoon can build a nest with it.
- Garbage can locked or sealed shut – Keeping access to the garbage away from the raccoon is key.
How Do I Get Rid Of Raccoons?
There are some obvious signs that you may have raccoons in your home. These are sounds of scurrying in the attic or a smell that is really bad may let you know you have raccoons in the attic. In the wintertime, they are looking for shelter and it is their mating season. Also, the mating season runs from from January to March and the babies are born from April to May. Three to four are born during this time and the litter is called kits.
If you aren’t sure if it is babies or adults in the attic, one sign may be that the adult leaves at nighttime to search for food. This is a good time to seal the entryway to keep the raccoon out. But, if you have babies and a mother in the attic, they may stay through the winter. Kits will stay until about 2-3 months later and then they and the mother will leave, thus allowing you to seal up the entryway they use.
Other Recommended Maintenance
Now that you know about getting rid of raccoons in the attic, let’s take a look at some other areas of maintenance. One of those is knowing what a raccoon’s nest looks like. It may look like a largely abandoned nest from a fox or bird. Also, it could be a den, burrow, under a porch, or in the attic.
Next, if you see white flies on your plants, you may wonder if they bite. The good news is no, they enjoy the sap from the plant leaves and are mainly interested in laying more eggs and reproducing.
Lastly, if you find you have ants in the bathroom, then you need to find out where the entry points are as well as why they want to come into the bathroom. The faster you can get rid of them the better.
When Do I Call A Professional?
Enlisting the help of a professional to help with the removal of raccoons is important. This is not something you want to be doing on your own. This professional can be a wildlife professional or a pest control company. The pest control company can find where the raccoon’s point of entry is and help you get rid of them.
Conclusion
Raccoons love the food that is left out and love to explore new places. You definitely don’t want them in your attic. Unfortunately, they can destroy things in the yard and home and are a danger to your family. If you try to get rid of them on your own and fail to do so, call.a professional. All South Pest Control will be able to determine your raccoon removal needs and offer the best preventative maintenance for future pest issues in McDonough, GA, and the surrounding areas.
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