Advice Sought: One Man's Remarkably Uncourageous Struggle Against a Winged Menace

In My Humble Opinion
1

In February of 2002, my beautiful new bride and I purchased a fairly old house near Trenton, New Jersey, one that the realtor described as “having character” when he meant it had “more cracks and flaws than an AMERICAN IDOL semifinalist.” Still, I have some experience in contracting and remodeling, and we got a heck of a deal on the place, so we bought it anyway.

In August of that year, we were awakened in the middle of the night by a strange sound, which turned out to be our cats positively squealing with glee. After some investigation, we realized that the reason they were so happy was that there was a big, ugly, brown bat swooping around downstairs. After some reasoned discussion (Me: “AAAAAAAAUUUGGGGGGGHHHH”; She: “EEEEEEEEEEEEEEAAKKKKK!”), we decided to call Animal Control. After a bit of wrangling, our uninvited guest was removed from the house. We had a good laugh about the whole thing, and went about our lives.

Last spring, while raiding the refrigerator late one night, I heard a sound coming from behind the fridge that sounded like a cricket on steroids. Sure enough: another bat. This time, we actually sealed off the kitchen, duct-taping a dropcloth over the entrance (hey, it was late, we didn’t know what else to do). Our house bats, however, have mysterious powers, because by dawn it was swooping around our bedroom. We cornered it, called Animal Control, and it departed, as well. Three nights later, another bat. This time, I found it sitting - gak - on my towel in the bathroom. I tossed another towel on top of it, and just carried the thing outside and set it free. Finally, a week later, still ANOTHER of these winged threats to life and limb spent about fifteen minutes careening around my house before finally finding an open door and flying free.

Well, we went on a spree. We caulked every crack we could find. We used duct tape to seal the fireplace. We stuffed towels under the attic door to make sure nothing could get underneath. We called a pest control service, who fogged our attic - nothing came out - and sealed up external openings into the house. And for nigh on a year, the bats came no more.

Then, last night, we heard a familiar chirping coming from inside the upright halogen lamp in our bedroom. After discussing our options (Me: “UgUgUgUgUgUg”; She: “Ohmygoddon’tleavemealoneintheroomwithit”), we eventually got this one outside, too.

But the whole thing has me at my wit’s end. I am kind of horrified by these things - they’re ungainly and ugly, and the one time I tried to catch one it hissed like a cat and pretty much came after me (I threw a blanket at it and it flew away). But my wife is developing a pathological fear of them; she didn’t sleep at all last night, jumping out of bed every time she heard a sound in the house. She is seven months pregnant right now, and she’s really upset about the idea of bringing a baby into the Storyteller Home for Wayward Bats.

So I turn to you, the Straight Dope community. What can I do? I have absolutely no idea how these things are getting in - unless I’m missing something, I’ve sealed just about every opening in the house at this point. Any advice? Or anyone interested in buying an animal-friendly five bedroom Colonial in Hamilton, NJ?

2

Hmmm Storyteller - seems you have quite a problem. Tell me about the heating system, and the basement? Are there grates on the floor blowing heat into individual rooms? Your basement…is it a crawl space or actual basement. And finally, your dryer out-take to the outside…is it screened in?

All of what I mentioned above were looked over by yours truly when we had a bat problem in our cottage in VT…seeing how it was brand new (old one burned down) I wondered, and wondered, and pondered, and pondered how the little vermin got in. Well, they were sneaking in through the grates in the floor, having gained access through a dryer outlet in the basement, and chewed their way through the skimpy lining of the outlet, and into the ductwork and into our home…

3

Bats are cool. When I was growing up in Michigan we had a house that had bats roosting in the carraige house and occassionally we’d get them in the house, too. The best way to deal with them is knock them down with tennis racquets. Their echo-location doesn’t allow them to “see” the strings. As for getting them out permanantly, that’ll be tough. They can get through quite small holes. The good news is they eat a heck of a lot of insects, and it’s fun to watch them swoop and dive after them at twilight.

StG

4

I’d be freaking out. I think bats are cool as long as they’re outside. If they were in my house I’d be a dead person over it. Is there a bat house in your area? The operators of that might have an idea of what to do. Dude, I’d sell the house. Especially with a little one on the way. Oh my god. I’m freaking out just thinking about it.

5

Visiting my great-great aunt’s place in Michigan many years ago…

I’m sitting in her living room, just hanging out.

A bat comes down the hallway and starts flying about. I yell!

My 85 year old G-g-aunt comes out of the kitchen, mutters ‘Those damn things’ (causing my heart to skip a beat right there), grab a kitchen broom and takes swing as sweet as DiMaggio’s and smacks the thing right out of the air!

Then she flings it outside and goes back to the kitchen.

Needless to say I was impressed.

6

Phlosphr -

We have steam heat, with radiators, so no floor vents. However, we do have a full basement, in which the washer/dryer is stored; I’ve never even looked at the dryer outlet. We leave the basement door open at all times, too, because the cats’ litter is down there. I wonder if that could be it.

Kalhoun -

Actually, we’ve had the house on the market for about three weeks, due to matters totally unrelated to the wee little beasties. If it sells soon, my wife will be the happiest person on earth (I will be a close second).

7

I agree, bats are cool. I’ll share my own bat story:

Nighttime at the cottage. My sister and I and my parents, each in our bedrooms.

I look across the hall: in my parents bedroom, the lights are on, and two bats are fluttering around. My parents are murmuring. At the time I figured they were planning tomorrow’s dinner; as it turns out they were probably whispered versions of “jayzus, there’s a bat in here” and “holy shit what do we do” and “shhhh! don’t wake the kids” and so on. Eventually my mom comes into my room, a bit freaked out, and says “now, cowgirl, I don’t want you to panic but I think there’s a bat in the cottage.” Smart-ass me said “Actually I think there are two bats” at which point my mom reports her already excessively pounding heart increased its rate.

Soon I find myself in the living room (gleeful at being up waaaaay past my bedtime, and even more gleeful that my sister is sleeping through the whole thing - imgaine how cool I’m going to be tomorrow morning, when I get to tell the story!), watching my parents chasing a bat around the cottage with mops and brooms, accidentally whacking furniture and each other. As any kid would be, I was massively entertained.

Eventually the bats met their fates with the cleaning utensils: broom, mop and bat bits were left outside for the night.

After the mop fiasco, they had seen another bat and decided to just go back to bed. Good times.

So after this eventful evening they asked around to find out how to deal with bats, and got some very good advice. (This advice will help you evacuate them without fear; I can’t comment on keeping them out in the first place.)

Turn on all the lights and wait. The bat will be freaked out for a few minutes (especially if you are chasing it around with a broom), but if left alone will soon find a place to perch, usually a curtain rod or some such thing. Using a piece of cardboard, brush the bat into a paper bag, then dump the bag outside. The bat will be gone by morning.

8

This may sound crazy, but try putting up a bat house.

The problem isn’t having bats around your house, it’s having bats in your house. Giving them another, more hospitable spot to roost might keep them out of your basement.

9

Black Chicken, Come baaaaaack!!!

(quote from the movie “Love at First Bite”, guess you had to see it )

10

They are more than likely coming up from the basement…and probably from the dryer outlet.

11

Another possibility: the bats are nesting in the attic, but occasionally find their way to the rest of the house via a hole in the floor around a [possibly defunct or now missing] outflow pipe, and maybe even a ventilation pipe. I rented in a house once where the second floor had once had a bathroom, and there was a big hole in the back of a storage nook into a first-floor closet.

What about chimneys?

Good luck with your bat problem. Those critters can be extremely unnerving.

12

The one time I had a bat in my house, I solved the situation with a Shop Vac.

Your best bet is to camp outside the house around dusk and see if you can spot where they are leaving from. Then patch the hole with a metal mesh.

13

This Is a good idea. Still, I can’t help feel that some sonic device might be just the trick to drive them off. The problem is, every person I’ve ever spoken with whose bought one of those sonic rodent repellers has said that they were junk and a waste of money.

Hypothetically, you’d want a device that generated a large amount of sound waves without bothering the OP poster or his family. It should be energy efficient and it should conform to code as well as to the aesthetic beauty of a classic early American mansion.

Wait a minute! What if we combined both Mr. Moto’s idea and mine…?

I wonder if the OP poster has ever considered… building a Belfry? :stuck_out_tongue:

PS- Playing “Smoke on the Water” late at night should be sufficient to drive off the bats…but he’d really need to have the whole family helping him pull those ropes to get the timing right…

<ducks & runs>

14

Well I am heading to bed and I will have nightmares. Good night all!

15

While everyone is having fun with bats, keep in mind they often carry rabies. Don’t handle them. Call Animal Control or a pest controller.

16

picunurse - Actually, bats don’t frequently carry rabies.

This is from http://www.batsnorthwest.org/

Here are some tips for getting rid of bats:

  1. How can I kill the bats living in my attic?
    *Bats are mammals like we are, and any poison used on them can affect the occupants of the house. Additionally, bats are so important for controlling insects that it would be a shame to kill off this natural form of pest control. Rather than killing the bats living in your attic, you would be better off to get rid of them by excluding them. It is a permanent solution and you won’t have bat bodies rotting in your rafters.

  2. How can I safely get rid of the bats in my attic?
    *The best way to get rid of bats is also the safest - for both the bats and the humans involved. This is to exclude them. But in this area, this must not be done during May, June or July because this is when babies are born and still unable to fly. Bats that live with us must still go out each night to hunt. If they can’t get back into your house in the morning, they will have to go somewhere else to live. This is how you do this:
    Find their entries by looking for stained places on the sides of your house and watching in the evening for them to emerge.

Buy some nylon netting (holes 1/4" square or less). This can be purchased by the foot in stores such as Home Depot.

During the day while the bats are asleep in their roosts, tack or tape the netting over the entries. Tack only at the top and sides, leaving the netting hanging loosely down a foot below the entry.

When the bats emerge, they will meet the netting and start climbing around trying to find a way out. Soon they will get out the bottom and go off to eat. But they are not clever enough to get back in the same way in the morning. You have created a “one-way door”.

Leave the netting up for 2-3 nights to make sure all the bats are out.

Take the netting down and caulk the holes. This is very important because the bats will return if they can!

  1. If I put up a bat house, will the bats leave my attic?
    *Unfortunately, no! Bats are extremely faithful to a preferred roost and attics are usually much warmer, quieter, safer and larger than a bat house. If you don’t exclude them from the attic, they will continue to live there and probably not use the bat house. But putting up a bat house when an exclusion is being done is wise. When the bats are left homeless, they will have a new place to go and you will keep them in the neighborhood eating your bugs!

StG

17

Just an update:

We had another one this morning, hanging around in the kitchen napping. Animal control came - I think they know us by name now - and took him away (we had to have him tested for rabies, since he was downstairs with the cats at least part of the night and we don’t know if he might have interacted with the cats at all).

We sealed off the basement completely before going to bed last night, so I guess that rules out the basement as a point of origin. Gah!

18

Hopefully your cats have their rabies shots. My parents had the same problem - numerous bats getting into the house. They were coming in through the chimney and getting into the basement trough the furnace ductwork. They sealed something up (I don’t want to say they sealed the chimney, but there was something up there that allowed the bats to get into the house) and they stopped coming in.

A former co worker of mine had bats in her very old house, and she called animal control. The bats turned out to be an endangered species, and they couldn’t do anything about them. She eventually sold the house, so I don’t know if the bats are still there or not.