Suburban Raccoons

Are you wondering how raccoons could possibly get in your attic? Well, there are numerous ways they can get to your roof and from there into your attic. It is nice and warm and protected from the elements! We had a family of raccoons in our attic. We will tell you about how they found their way into ours. If you need information about getting rid of them, we have lots of articles and posts about dealing with this problem. Also some of the safety issues on our website. Check out the categories and recent posts about raccoon issues that you will need to deal with. These include: getting rid of Raccoons, Dealing with Raccoon Scat and also once they are out, how do you keep them out.

How did Raccoons Get in the Attic

This post, however, is all about how they get into the attic. Our home is pretty typical. We have a brick front and the sides and back are clad with siding. There are trees in front and on the side, but they are not touching the house or the roof. so when we first found that raccoons were in our attic, we wonder how they got there. Well, it turns out they are great climbers as the picture on the left shows.  This guy is on the 6th floor of an apartment building! They climbed right up the brick on the front of our home and then onto the roof over the garage!

Once they were on the roof, it was a simple matter to get into the attic space over the living room. Our house has a roof that overlaps another roof. Where it overlaps there is a spot were the soffit ( that is the areas under the roof on the side of the house were your roof juts out, away from the side of the house usually or in this case over a lower roof) is easily accessed and they were able to push one of the metal flanges up and then crawl into the attic.

Difficult Task to Remove These Raccoons

They had a grand time in there burrowing under the insulation and creating a little raccoon family home to have and raise their young.  Once I figured out that they were there and how they were getting in,  you might think that it is a simple matter to get these raccoons out of our attic. Not so, due to the time of year and the age of their pups.

It seems that if you block the access to the attic, they will try desperately to get back inside and may even tear your roof apart in order to get inside and back to their babies. There is the right way to stop them and there is also the right time to get them out as well.  We strongly suggest you read some of our other posts before you proceed with removal so that you do not waste your time and your money or just make the problem a lot worse.

Forget About Trapping Raccoons in the Attic

If you think that you are going to trap these pesky critters, chances are you’re going to fail since they are really smart and urban raccoons are well versed in avoiding traps. If you are lucky enough to trap one, check with your local community on the bylaws concerning what you can and cannot do with raccoons. You may be surprised to learn that you are not allowed to take them very far away from your home.

Even if you can take them many miles away, you really have not solved the problem. Once your attic has become a den, families of raccoons can tell that there is a den and secondly whether it is occupied or not. When one moves out for whatever reason another family is just going to move back in. The best way to get rid of raccoons is to install a one-way trap door over the entrance to the den in your attic so they can get out but not back in. check out some of our other posts on this subject.

We have lots of posts about this subject and what to do on this web site so check out the posts that deal with getting rid of raccoons. Happy reading and good luck.

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