Suburban Raccoons

If raccoons are on your roof or worse in your attic, you need to do several things. This is in addition to preventing raccoons from climbing brick walls. First, block the entrance to your attic with heavy gauge chicken wire. If they are inside you also need to add a one-way trap door to let them out and not back in. You do not want them to die inside your attic or tearing it apart trying to get out.

Preventing Raccoons from Climbing Brick Walls

Next, you want to focus on preventing them from climbing the brick walls and getting on your roof. If there are overhanging tree branches, trim your trees. They can easily climb brick walls too. Install wire guards that will act as a barrier if they are climbing the wall. This could also stop squirrels as long as the trees are not too close.

Remove all potential food sources around your property. This includes garbage bins, pet food, and even grubs in the lawn. Anything they can eat should be removed. You want to make your place unfriendly to raccoons! If you have skunks in the area, removing the food sources will also help deal with them.

Never handle raccoon poop by hand. Use plastic gloves, avoid breathing dust in the attic where there is poop from any animal including raccoons. Humans can easily become infected by microscopic worms that attack the eyes and the brain.

If there are young raccoons in the attic that are not old enough to travel on their own, you have two alternatives. Wait until they are old enough to travel on their own and get out the one-way trap door. Or you can install the one-way trap door and them go into the attic and remove the babies. Make sure the parents are not in the attic. They will attack to defend their young.

Raccoon latrines can be found in many different locations around your home, in your attic, on your roof, in your garden, etc. They are a place where raccoons leave their poop along with other animals. It is disgusting especially if you find them in your attic let alone in your garden. There is also a safety hazard associated with raccoon latrines. The scat can be infected with roundworms. They are very hardy. Roundworm eggs can exist in many different environments for months and years. Infection in humans from wound worms can cause blindness and even death. Wear a mask, use gloves, and never handle raccoon scat with your bare hands. Keep children and pets away from the area. Hire specialists to remove it from your attic or roof.

Discourage Raccoon Latrines – Attic

Install heavy gauge wire mesh across all entrances to your attic to keep them out. If you suspect the raccoons are inside your attic, install a one-way trap door across the opening so they can get out but not back in. Arrange to have your attic insulation removed and new insulation installed.

Discourage Raccoon Latrines – Roof

If there is raccoon scat on your roof, chances are that they are also inside your attic. Once you apply the solution mentioned above they will look for another home and stop using the latrine on your roof. Carefully remove the scat as mentioned above to avoid infection.

Discourage Raccoon Latrines – Yards

You may find the raccoon latrine at the base of a tree, alongside your foundation, and in other locations around your yard. Start by removing all potential food sources from your yard. This includes your garbage, fruits from fruit trees, grubs in your lawn, etc. Consumers have used a number of approaches with varying success.

• Auto motion-sensitive water sprayers
• Wire mesh over the area
• Food sources laced with jalapeno
• Mothballs
• Bright lights that turn on based on motion

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We cannot believe that someone actually feels that raccoons are the best at eating the leftovers! This is absolutely the wrong thing to do. Unless you want permanent residents around your home or even in your home attic. This is obviously a family of raccoons who live nearby. They have gotten used to eating all of the leftovers from this family. They will come every day to their door. Of course, they will break into this house if they think there is a chance of getting some food. The adults will also look for a den to have their babies. There will be more raccoons around, along with scat or feces and urine to contend with.

Raccoons are the Best at Eating the Leftovers

Yes, they will eat all of your leftovers. They will also get into your garbage bins and tear them apart to get at the food. If your yard has food sources such as grubs they will dig these up as well. In short, they will build a home/den in your home or in one of the neighbor’s homes.

We do not recommend that you feed the raccoons. It does not matter that they are cute etc. They can be quite vicious if cornered. Or if their young pups are threatened. Or if you try to pick them up. They also carry disease which is also dangerous to humans.

People have died from the diseases they carry and have been permanently disfigured by raccoons who fight back. just check out the rest of our website to see some of the pictures that show just how dangerous they are.

No one really wants to deal with this guy, after all he is defending his family or his den and will do what is necessary to make sure you do not get too close. Many people have been severely injured by raccoons. There is also the damage that they cause while them make a home in the attic of your home or one of your out buildings. Pets control services companies will tell you that the best way to get rid of raccoons is to prevent them from making a home in your attic in the first place. Then you will really not have to deal with damage, clean up and getting rid of them.

Pest Control Services

If you already have then use a professional company that uses a one way trap door to remove them and prevent them from entering again. A one way trap door will allow them to leave but not get back in. If they have babies, they will need to be removed and placed somewhere they can be found by the parents. If you do not remove them the raccoons will do a lot more damage trying to rescue them. In addition there is the smell as well to deal with if they should die in your attic. The pest control services companies will provide you with arecommendation regarding all potential entrances and what to do about each of them.

Raccoon Prevention

The best way to deal with raccoons in your neighborhood is to remove all potential sources of food from them. If they cannot find anything to eat and they cannot find anywhere to hole up for the day, then they will move on to another neighborhood. Don’t leave your garbage out at night. Remove all possible food sources. If you have grubs in your lawn, both skunks and raccoons are going to be coming for dinner, not to mention your grass looking pretty sickly. Kill the grubs and you will remove this food source.

Clogged gutters also provide a source of drinking water so keep them clean and clear. Bird feeders are a favorite as well as mice that might hang around to take advantage of the bird seed. Remove tree branches that overhang your roof and block all entrances to underneath your deck. They may still come around but at lease they will not remain for long.

Wow, what a mess these raccoons have made to this person’s home. They placed a board initially against the side of the home to stop them from going into their attic and then the raccoons just dug a hole in the roof so that they could get into their den! These people sure could use some raccoon repellant, however, does raccoon repellant really work, or is it a waste of time?

Once you have a problem with raccoons getting into your home, there is no raccoon repellant that is going to work. The problem these people had is that the raccoons probably had their babies inside the attic of this home. They usually have babies in the late winter and if you block the entrance to the den, they will go crazy until they can rescue their baby raccoons. This usually involves doing a lot more damage to your roof and then water gets in and it can go into thousands of dollars in damages. There are better ways to get rid of these raccoons that will keep them out on a permanent basis.

Racoon Repellant – What Should a Home Owner do About this Situation

The first thing is not to block the entrance until the raccoon pups are old enough to travel on their own. While no one wants raccoons in the attic, you will actually minimize the damage the parents will do by not blocking the entrance.

Once the pups are old enough to travel on their own, have a professional install a one-way trap door so that they all can get out but not back in. Once they are out, then you can install a more permanent solution after repairing your roof. The permanent solution is heavy gauge wire mesh over the opening or area where they were getting into your attic.

Raccoon Repellants that Do Not Work

We had raccoons in our attic and we tried a number of things that were suggested to us by searching on the internet. basically, none of them worked, so do not waste your time. We tried:

• Loud music
• Mothballs
• Trapping
• etc

None of this stuff worked for us! We eventually called a professional animal removal company. They first told us to do nothing until the babies raccoons were old enough to travel. They then showed up at our door in May when the babies were coming out every day. The technician installed a one-way trap door over the opening. They all could get out and none of them could get back in. Sounds so simple, doesn’t it?

Once they were all out, this company came back, checked the attic for us to make sure they were really out and then removed the one-way trap door, repaired the damage for us, and then installed a permanent heavy gauge wire mesh over the opening to prevent raccoons from getting in ever again. They also looked our house over and installed wire mesh everywhere else that were potential entry spots. They completed this work for us in a very professional manner.

Why Install a Wire Mesh vs. Using Racoon Repellant?

There are actually very good reasons for this permanent approach vs. using various other types of repellents.  First, this is a permanent solution. The current family of raccoons is not coming back and no other families of raccoons are not going to be able to get into your home either. Even the young will come back once they mature unless you deal with them in this way.

Noise, mothballs and all of the other stuff just does not work. Unless you install a permanent solution, you will always have to use some form of repellant if by chance it does work. They can smell a den from the street and will come back to your home whenever you remove the deterrent.

But again, it is our belief that these repellents just do not work so do not waste your time.

Five Years Later

It has been five years since we had a problem with raccoons in the attic. After installing the wire mesh over the opening, we have not had any problems. In the wintertime, we have seen tracks in the snow on our roofs. Raccoons are checking the entry location out to see if they can get back in, but they are foiled by the wire mesh.

In five years’ time, almost every year we have had tracks on our roof. This really means that other families of raccoons have decided to try our place. Perhaps they are descendants of the original family and are trying to get back into one of their old dens. This just shows you how long you would have to use some kind of raccoon repellent. Installing a permanent solution such as heavy gauge wire mesh over the opening is far better.

The deterrent of raccoons entering your attic can save you a lot of repair costs as well as frustration. This site is dedicated to dealing with raccoons that invade our homes. Apparently, a lot of people search for the term” raccoon deterrent”. The word raccoon is spelled incorrectly, so we are doing a post just for them.

Many of us, myself included, when we are confronted with raccoons invading our space is one of anger and frustration. We want to kill them and we want them gone as fast as possible. Unfortunately, the reality is actually much different and it sometimes takes a while for this to sink in. Here is a list of the simple facts and misconceptions, along with Racoon Deterrent solutions which are depicted in the picture above, but we will get to that a little bit later in the post.

More Details

Here is our list of things that you should be aware of in dealing with raccoons:

• They have babies and they will tear your roof apart to get at them if you block the entrance
• If you are lucky enough to get rid of one family of raccoons, another will move in.
• There are hundreds of raccoons in every square mile
• Some municipalities make it illegal to trap raccoons and move them more than two blocks away from your home
• They are very smart and trapping them is almost impossible
• Raccoons will always come back once they establish a den unless you block them
• The feces turn to powder when dry and there are bacteria in the feces which can infect humans making us very sick, be careful
• Some raccoons will have rabies as well
• They are not friendly to humans but can survive very well in urban areas
• If you poison them, you may end up with a dead raccoon in your attic smelling the place up, and/or you may have a neighbor mad at you because their pet just died from poison.

So now you have read all of this and are wondering what to do. Well, the answer is pretty simple when it comes to raccoon deterrents.

Racoon Deterrent

First of all, you have to wait until the young babies are old enough to travel on their own. If you do not, the parents will try to get back into the den any way they can and this includes tearing your roof apart or creating another entrance somewhere. They will not abandon their young. Admirable in some ways compared to many humans.

Once they are old enough, the solution is pretty simple. Either do this yourself or hire a professional to do it for you. Using heavy gauge chicken wire, install it over the opening and create a one-way trap door so that the raccoons can get out but they cannot get back in. This is the best and only way to really deal with them.

Install a Permanent Repair

Once you are sure that all raccoons have left the den, it is time to complete repairs and install a permanent covering of chicken wire over the opening and any other potential openings. Make sure it is a heavy gauge so that they cannot break it. Also, make sure that the screw nails you use to hold it in place are sealed with long-lasting waterproof silicon to avoid any leaks into your home. The picture above shows a typical installation.

The raccoons would climb up the brick onto the roof. Then they pushed the soffit away to get into the attic of our home. In this case, it was above the garage, which was not too bad, but still, you never want them anywhere in your home. The wire mesh installed by a professional animal control technician was completed in about 30 minutes and really did the job. While he was there, he covered several other areas that were potential trouble spots for raccoons as well as birds and squirrels.

Humane Racoon Deterrent

Many of us talk a lot and make claims that we will just shoot them, but the reality is that if you live in suburbia, shooting them in just not an option. Poison does not work either since others will just move in and many animal rights people will complain as well if they were to find out. This solution that we have described makes everyone happy and it is also a great long-term solution. Shooting and poisoning are only temporary since another family of raccoons will just come along and move in in a few weeks or months and then you have the same problem all over again.

Installing the one-way trap door gets them all out of your attic so they do not die a horrible death inside your home and also do more damage. Installing the wire mesh over the opening will ensure that raccoons can never again invade your space inside your home.

We have had damage like that shown on the picture on the left in our lawn. Our lawn has been dug up during the evening and at night since raccoons are generally nocturnal. In fact, it got so bad that they would dig up the lawn to find grubs and earthworms, then carry them over to our pool and wash the food off in the pool before eating whatever they had found. There are really two problems – the first is that we have grubs in the lawn which eat the roots of the lawn and secondly the raccoon eating grubs from the lawn.

The dirt and mess left on the steps of our pool were disgusting and we really had a difficult time cleaning this up the next day. Our next post which will be available in two weeks will cover “How to get rid of raccoons”, will be of interest to those people who have similar problems to ourselves. So stay tuned.

In the meantime, I wanted to find out what their eating habits were so that I could possibly use this information to help control the raccoons in our area. We have made quite a few posts about how to remove raccoons from your attic in a safe manner and keep them out. Refer to some of our earlier posts about these subjects.

What are Raccoon Eating Habits?

Urban and suburban raccoons will eat just about anything available that falls into the plant area, birds, fish, small animals, and leftovers from your meals which get thrown out in the garbage. From some of the sources, we looked at they eat invertebrates, plant material, and vertebrates. These consist of nuts, berries, all kinds of fruit, fish, crustaceans, grubs, small birds, small mammals, insects, worms, and garbage as mentioned.

It is so bad in our area that we cannot put the garbage out the night before, or the raccoons will get into it and scatter the garbage all over the street. What a mess they make. during the rest of the week, they are looking for some of the food sources previously mentioned.

If you have grubs on your lawn, the raccoons will find them. This is the reason the lawn has been dug up in the picture above. There are chemicals that can get rid of the grubs which remove the food source for the raccoons and by the way, ensures that your lawn will be more healthy. The grubs like to eat the roots of the grass which of course will kill the grass as well. These grubs are white and about the size of your little finger. They provide lots of protein and the raccoons love them.

What do Raccoons eat in the Winter Time?

Raccoons will build up weight and fat during the fall when food is more plentiful. They love acorns and walnuts which provide lots of calories and will fill up on these to put on weight. If you suspect there are raccoons in the area, take action. You want to dissuade them from spending time in your yard. Pick up the nuts so that there is no food source for the raccoons.

Raccoons will go into what is called winter rest, which is not full hibernation during the winter in colder climates. This reduces their activity drastically and lowers their metabolism as well.  Fat built up in the fall will help them last through the winter. However, if they think there is a food source available e.g. your garbage. They will be out to sample every garbage day unless there is a tremendous amount of snow.

Since winter rest is not hibernation, they can quickly rouse themselves. They will go out of their dens to seek food sources that might be available. They will emerge from the den when the snow melts or there are warmer days in the wintertime.

Discouraging Raccoons Eating

The best way to avoid raccoons in your area is to remove all possible food sources. Fruit, nuts such as acorns and walnuts, grubs in your lawn and lock up your garbage. If you must keep it outside or put it out the night before, use a garbage container that is animal proof. If there are no food sources, they simply will not waste their time visiting your property.

Tricks such as loud noises, lights, even chasing them simply do not work. They are used to living with humans and really are not afraid of us. Although they will be cautious around us. You can put your dog out at night. However, he may keep you awake as these nocturnal visitors come to visit. The best approach by far is to remove all potential sources of food. Protect your home as well in the manner we have outlined in