Suburban Raccoons


About

Raccoons got into our attic while we were away on vacation this past spring. We thought we heard something banging in the attic, when we arrived home, and unfortunately chose to ignore these sounds. These are very crafty and street smart raccoons and that is why I called them suburban raccoons. Our neighbor called us to tell us the raccoons had broken part of the soffit, and had actually fallen through onto the cement step. They were fine, but our house was damaged. He was kind enough to repair the raccoon damages for us. I tried a number of so called solutions that I found on the internet, however in the end I had to call a specialist to deal with the raccoons. They managed to remove the raccoons and  repaired the damage the raccoons had caused. He informed us that we should wait until the babies were old enough to travel! Can you imagine?

This was in March and he indicated that the raccoons probably had babies and would do anything to get back into our attic if we blocked the hole they had created. In fact they would tear the roof apart to get at them if necessary! He suggested that we wait until they were old enough then he would trap them. The bad part was that we had to wait two to three months and that he would only take the raccoons 2 blocks away due to local raccoon bylaws. Who knew and how ridiculous was that. He wanted $600 and really would not fixed the problem since they would definitely come back when dropped off that close. We wanted a better way to get rid of our raccoon invaders.

My answer to this was to buy my own trap and then release the raccoons 10 miles away, unharmed. I was able to trap the young raccoons and the adults left a little while later. But there was more problems to be concerned about before we stopped the raccoon damage. . . .

The Raccoons climbed a tree and up the brick. Once on the roof they pushed the soffit back under and overhang and found their way into the attic. These raccoons did a lot of damage in our attic to our insulation and if they have young babies will tear your roof apart to get too them.

I tried using mothballs to get the raccoons to leave, however they just ignored that, so do not waste your time. Nor do many of these other so called deterrents. You have to trap them and you have to be smart about it, since they will discover ways to get the food out of the trap without setting the trap off.

Another word of caution, if you are going into the attic, make sure you are wearing a breathing mask since their feces turn to powder and will cause potential damage to your lungs if you breathe some of this dust into your lungs.

Browse our website for other hints and tips about catching and removing raccoons from your attic. We finally hired a specialist who installs wire mesh across all openings so there is no way for them to enter. At the main entrance they install a one way trap door for them to get out and not back in. This is a permanent solution to getting rid of the raccoons in our attic.

If you have experience with raccoons and found something that worked, let us know by leaving a comment. Spam comments will be deleted. We are accepting Donations to help us keep this site going. Click here if you wish to donate.

We use third-party advertising companies to serve ads when you visit our website. These companies may use information (not including your name, address, email address, or telephone number) about your visits to this and other websites in order to provide advertisements about goods and services of interest to you. If you would like more information about this practice and to know your choices about not having this information used by these companies,visit Google.com.

?>