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Raccoon Removal
Raccoons are fascinating creatures with great strength, agility, and adaptability. They are considered pests because they have adapted to living with humans. As great climbers, they easily gain access to attics and may even raise their littles there. Similarly, they wreak havoc in their path causing structural damages. Furthermore, their feces become a breeding ground for bacteria and they’re known to spread several diseases.
Here are some of the major problems caused by raccoons:
- Raccoons living in the attic or chimney.
- Tipping over garbage cans for food.
- Stealing pet food or birdseed.
- Confronting pets likes dogs.
- Risk of diseases.
Why Do You Have a Raccoon Problem?
Raccoons are attracted to human settlements for three fundamental reasons: food, water, and shelter.
Food & Water
Raccoons are omnivores and scavengers. This means that they will feed on anything, including fruits, vegetables, nuts, fish, frogs, and even dead animals. Not to forget the leftovers in the garbage and even pet food. A water bowl in a yard can also attract these nuisance creatures.
Shelter
Human settlements provide raccoons with warmth and comfort and they love it. That’s why they go through the stress of breaking through homes – because they know it’s worth it.
Raccoon Removal Process
Dealing with a raccoon infestation problem takes an integrated approach. Applying multiple methods simultaneously will give you a better chance of getting rid of them and keeping them at bay. For this, you should consider using a professional wildlife removal company like Wildlife X Team Oklahoma City. But here’s how to go about it on your own.
Eliminating Attractants
The simple truth is that irrespective of what you do, if you do not get rid of the food in your yard or make it impossible for raccoons to reside in your home, then any effort to get rid of them will be short-lived. Here are some things to bear in mind:
- Properly secure your trash can so it is inaccessible to raccoons.
- Clear away fallen fruits, birdseed, and other food crumbs from your yard.
- Do not leave your pet food or leftovers outside.
- Make sure that you block all entry holes in your attic.
- Installing a chimney cap will make it impossible for them to access your chimney.
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Identify Areas of Damage
The goal at this stage is to identify where the raccoons are staying so you can create a strategic control plan. Places of high raccoon activities include attics, gardens, fish ponds, crawlspaces, trashcans, and more.
Raccoon Control Methods
After you know where the problem is arising from, it’s important to set up a strategy to either get rid of them or capture them. Wildlife X Team Oklahoma City can help you implement the right control method to rid you of your raccoon infestation problem.
Live Trapping
This is the most effective means of getting rid of raccoons. If you have raccoons living in your attic, you will have to seal all entry holes except one, in which you install an exclusion device. Thereafter you can bait the trap with whole eggs or fresh fish to capture the raccoon. After the raccoon has been caught, it is important to inspect your attic to ensure that her babies are also removed. Another strategy is to first capture the babies when the mother is away and use them to lure their mother into a trap. The entire family can then be relocated to a location, at least, 10 miles from the capture site.
Repellents
There are a plethora of raccoon repellents available including ammonia, pepper, mothballs, and more. However, repellents are not effective for dealing with raccoons. If they still have access to food and shelter, they’ll put up with minor inconveniences.
Decontamination of Infected Spaces
If you have a raccoon living in your attic, chimney, or crawlspace, it’s certainly going to leave lots of droppings, nesting materials, hair, and food. These remnants attract insects and become a breeding ground for diseases like Salmonella or Leptospirosis. Raccoon feces may also contain roundworms. That’s why the infected space has to be decontaminated with an enzyme-based cleaner to destroy all germs. At Wildlife X Team Oklahoma City, we help our clients decontaminate the infected spaces after removal is complete.
Repairs
The chewed wood, torn insulation materials, pipes, and even damaged electrical wires have to be repaired after a raccoon removal. More importantly, all potential entry holes or vulnerable spots have to be fortified to prevent reentry by another raccoon.
Wildlife X Team Oklahoma City takes a holistic approach in creating an effective removal and control plan that will take care of your raccoon infestation problem. If you are dealing with raccoons and live in the Oklahoma City area, call us today!
How to Exclude a Raccoon
Exclusion is an effective technique for keeping animals out of your home. At Wildlife X Team Oklahoma City, we regularly conduct raccoon exclusion, squirrel exclusion, and bat exclusion. We like this technique because it often doesn’t require any trapping and still prevents animals from returning to your home. To learn more about how to prevent raccoons from entering your home visit raccooninformation.com
Exclusion basically means that you set up a sort of one-way door, meaning the animal can exit your home but won’t be able to enter. There are several tools we use to accomplish this. We strongly recommend hiring a professional to do this work – at Wildlife X Team Oklahoma City, we have spent hundreds of hours excluding raccoons. However, if you want to try your hand at it, we have some practical tips for you.
Raccoon Exclusion Tips
Before we go any further, it’s important that you understand a bit about raccoon behavior. In general, the exclusion is not a good idea if the raccoon in question is female. That’s because in this case, it’s likely that there are babies close by. If you exclude a mother raccoon and its babies are still inside your home, prepare yourself for epic damage to your property.
This is another big reason why we strongly suggest you leave raccoon exclusion up to the experts like our team at Wildlife X Team Oklahoma City. We know what to look for when determining if a male or female raccoon is your culprit. We can also provide expert raccoon removal services when you have a family of these creatures living in your home.
In general, raccoon exclusion is only a good idea if you know for certain that there is only one raccoon on your property, or there are only adult animals with no babies.
Raccoon Exclusion Doorway
There are really two methods for animal exclusion. The first uses an exclusion doorway. This is our preferred method for most animals because it doesn’t require any trapping. However, it can be less effective for raccoons since they are very determined, strong, and dexterous creatures.
This is basically a steel cage trap with a trapdoor on one end and an opening on the other. The basic concept is that the exclusion doorway goes over the raccoon’s entry point – the animal can then exit through the doorway but won’t be able to reenter.
The issue with an exclusion doorway is that sometimes, the raccoon will really want to get back inside your home. In this case, there isn’t much you can do to stop the animal. Raccoons are strong and have five fingers on each paw so they’re incredibly dexterous. If they want to, they can rip your home apart.
Raccoon Exclusion Trapping
Exclusion trapping is the second method. We prefer this method for raccoons since it deals with the animal and provides exclusion to prevent reentry. The basic concept is the same as the exclusion doorway, but you use a trap instead.
To set up a raccoon exclusion trap, you should use a large steel cage trap with a single door. Place it directly over the raccoon’s entry point so it will be forced into the trap as it leaves your home. You will need to secure the trap well so the raccoon can’t escape.
Once you have the animal trapped, then you can safely relocate it far away from your home. This will prevent undue damage from the animal trying to reenter buildings on your property. At this point, you should also seal the hole securely. Don’t skimp on this part – if you leave an easy entry point just barely sealed, you can be sure a raccoon will find it again.
How to keep raccoons off the roof?
Wild animals can cause big problems when they change their habitat and adapt to urban or semi-urban areas. Generally, these animals comprise an average size, which allows them to sneak into any hole in a house.
Thus, some of the species that possess the cunning to achieve this objective are rats, snakes, squirrels, and raccoons.
Raccoons are characterized by causing multiple damages such as destroying crops, gardens, messing up garbage, damaging structures of the house in order to create a hole to enter it, making noise with their footsteps on the roof, among other activities that will give you a hard time.
For this reason, in order to soften or completely eliminate this painful problem, many have sought countless methods to eradicate them or chase away the raccoon breeding around their properties.
Some of the most commonly used home methods are described below. However, the intervention of specialized equipment and pest control prevention is the best alternative to eradicate raccoons or other nuisance animals from your environment.
- Homemade repellents are based on ammonia or mothballs, which are odors that raccoons dislike. People usually spray this repellent on cloth and place them in strategic places where raccoons pass through.
- Chemical repellents either in liquid or granular form. They are sprayed in the surroundings creating a kind of barrier. In this case, it is recommended to spray them on the roof.
- Predatory urine such as foxes, coyotes, wild cats, wolves, among others. Due to survival instinct, raccoons will flee.
- Electric repellents can be strategically placed along paths to the garden, roof, crop areas, pool areas, patios, etcetera. They are usually more effective than the previous methods, and there are a variety of electrical devices that can be used for this purpose. Some of them, spotlights and ultrasonic noise generators that disturb the raccoon’s physiology, causing it to reject the area.
- Electric fence around property boundaries. This is not the best method, but can sometimes be very useful.
- Raccoon traps, often used for pest control, i.e., reducing the number of raccoons that have adapted to an urban or semi-urban habitat. In fact, this method is the most common and has advantages that will save you time and money. There is a wide range of traps available today; you should choose the one that best suits your needs, taking into consideration state laws regarding pest elimination.
If none of these methods work, it is recommended that you seek professional help, so you can enjoy an environment free of raccoons or other animals that may disturb the peace of your home and crops.
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Today, there are many organizations dedicated to pest control. Effectiveness and methods to be used are factors to consider when hiring a trained team, which is why Wildlife X Team Oklahoma City is recommended here.
Wildlife X Team Oklahoma City has excellent specialists who employ humane methods to remove wildlife from areas not conducive to human and raccoon interaction. The goal remains to provide favorable solutions to avoid wildlife problems and in the process inform the public about actions to be taken to avoid such mishaps.
Wildlife X Team Oklahoma City offers wildlife inspection reports, the results of which could be a determining factor for possible future invasions. In addition, they offer their services on flexible schedules. Do not hesitate to contact them, it is the best alternative to eliminate raccoons from your roof.
How to remove raccoons from under the shed?
Wildlife can become admirably adaptable to urban environments. So much has this adaptation developed that inevitably animals such as snakes, rats, bats, squirrels, and raccoons are now considered a pest. They usually hide in places such as roofs, attics, and basements. There they nest and breed.
Generally, raccoons tend to sneak through a hole into some homes and then inhabit strategic areas that are difficult for humans to access. For example, under the shed. These places allow them to move freely in search of food.
To remove raccoons from any area of the house or surrounding area, it is important to take special measures, employing methods that contribute to their removal.
Some people use repellents to repel raccoons, among these repellents we find: homemade, chemical, and electric repellents.
- Homemade: strong odors such as mothballs and ammonia are used. Also, urine essences of predatory animals such as foxes, wolves, wild cats, among others. These repellents are usually sprayed in places considered to be frequented by raccoons.
- Chemicals: these are repellents that come in both liquid and granular forms, which can be used to create a kind of barrier between raccoons and the property. This method can be effective, however, as mentioned before, these animals have an amazing capacity for adaptation, perhaps sooner or later they will find another entrance or adapt to the repellent.
- Electric: such as electric fences, spotlights, ultrasonic sounds, and other electricity emitting devices. This may be the most effective method of repelling raccoons, but it has some risks, as handling electricity is no easy task for the inexperienced.
Both repellents and other methods are effective in some cases where the raccoon invasion has not reached alarming levels. But if raccoons have reproduced enough to be a nuisance to humans, it is best to seek professional help.
Another alternative for removing raccoons from the shed is the use of traps. In fact, this method is one of the most widely used for pest control. It is important, before employing this alternative, to be informed of the state rules for the use of traps and animal control.
Also, it is crucial to avoid the proliferation of pests by not leaving food sources within their reach, uncovered garbage containers, food residues in the vicinity, or even pet food. If possible, piles of objects in places where they could easily hide should be avoided.
Seek professional help
Today, there are many companies that remove wildlife from human-inhabited environments because they cause a great deal of damage. For example, raccoons often damage gardens and crops, take out garbage, cause damage to the structure of the house by creating entrances, cause noises, among other things that disturb the tranquility of the home.
Thus, when seeking help from a trained team, two aspects should be considered: experience and methods. Wildlife X Team Oklahoma City can help you with wildlife control. Ranked among the top in the pest control industry, it has experienced professionals who will seek solutions to problems with raccoons or other animals that are disturbing the order of your home.
They also offer inspections to determine areas prone to wildlife. In addition, they provide information to the public so that they can proceed with activities to prevent future invasions within the parameters of the property.
Wildlife X Team Oklahoma helps you remove animals from the human environment, employing humane methods and assuring users of good pest removal in their environment.
How To Get Raccoons Out of Attic
There are few animals as interesting to watch as Raccoons. However, you don’t want this fun around your house or Attic. Raccoons make a nasty presence/mess when they get into the homes or attics. And this makes them terrible pests or animals to live in your Attic.
People hardly hate raccoons, and they are just scared about the dangers and nuisances these animals contribute to the home. Some of them include;
- Transmitting disease,
- Making continuous thumping and chirping noises,
- Causing dirt and germs
- Leaving leftover foods and scratch marks
- Structural damage to the Attic
- Hurting pets and humans alike
What should I do about the Raccoon problem?
If you have a raccoon problem, the first thing is to assess how serious the issue is;
- Is it an infestation, or
- Some lost Raccoon seeking refuge in your Attic (often planning to migrate their family)
The degree of infestation determines how you solve the Raccoon issue.
- Raccoon removal method
Before tackling Raccoons, you must understand that they can be very aggressive when cornered. They may also be infected with rabies and other diseases from their time in the wild. Hence, it must either be handled by a professional or, while DIY, adhere to safe practices.
- Live trapping
This is a safe, strategic, and non-destructive option for removing raccoons from your Attic. A common method is to bait them to areas with a closed entry and “impossible to pass exit” This way, you can convey and relocate them comfortably.
You can also lure mother Raccoons with their babies while they are away.
There are numerous methods to trap a Raccoon (even in a colony). However, such a process requires heavy planning.
- Repellents
Using repellents is an effective method to ensure that Raccoons never get to your property in the first place. Also, there are many natural repellents for raccoons available even in homes and local stores. Some natural raccoon repellents include;
- Mothballs,
- Ammonia,
- Pepper
Scattering these repellants on the property, especially close to the food source or the Attic, can irritate the Raccoons out of your property.
- Traps
Although this method can be destructive, it is highly effective for smaller and singular raccoon invasions. There are various types of traps available for Raccoons, including;
- Gum traps,
- Net traps,
- Manual traps
- Making Attics uncomfortable
Raccoons only settle in the attics because they are cozy and comfortable. There are many ways to keep your attics repulsive, including;
- Constant fumigation,
- Removing all sources of food,
- Sealing up cracks
- Destroying any signs of their early nests
- Physically scaring them off
Why you should call us
We are an experienced company in removing pests and other wildlife living on your property. We understand that it can be difficult to bait these animals or remove them, and we come in very handy.
Our deeper understanding of the biology of these wildlife makes it easier for us to relocate them to a suitable environment (far from human settlement).
Why do Raccoons choose my Attic?
Raccoons prefer less contact or interaction with humans as much as possible. However, if they find your Attic cozy enough for their community, or
Closer to a source of food, they will attempt to colonize it.
The best way to control Raccoons in your Attic is to prevent them from entering the Attic.
What should I do after Removing Raccoons from my Attic
If Raccoons colonized your Attic for a period, there is a high chance it is already contaminated. Sources of contaminants include;
- Their nesting materials,
- Droppings and urine,
- Leftover foods,
- Saliva,
- Falling parasites that cling to their bodies.
The next thing to do after the thorough removal of Raccoons is to decontaminate.
