There are creatures in my boyfriend’s attic. Scurrying scratching creatures. He’s going to go up there soon to look around (has to acquire a ladder first), to try and figure out what to do.
Here’s the problem.
They’re not there all the time - the noises come and go. So there’s a good chance he’ll crawl up there with a flashlight and see nothing. How can we figure out exactly what kind of animal is trespassing? Does it really matter, anyway? Will a mouse trap catch a squirrel? I doubt it’s anything bigger than that, because there aren’t gaping holes in the roof. The problem seems to be limited to the attic - nothing has been chewed up anywhere in the house and there’s no sign of droppings anywhere.
Are there signs to look for, to tell what’s been living there? And if we can’t catch them in the act, what’s the best all-around trap/strategy to take care of all the most likely suspects?
Are you sure you mean to say WHO, and not ‘what’ is living in your attic? If you really mean ‘who’ then remind me not to come over to your house for dinner.
As for what it might be, my money is on squirrels or raccoons. I wish I could help more, but I have no experience with invading animals, so I’m just WAG.
You say that there aren’t any droppings around the house but that’s one of the first things I’d look for up in the attic (I’ve just gone through this experience myself whilst redoing the attic over my tv room). If you’ve been hearing noises for a while I bet you’ll find plenty of poop.
Bring a flashlight, gloves and a dust mask. Wear crappy clothes and wash them afterwards, lord knows what you’ll be stepping in
Anyhow look for feces - I had roof rats (common in my area), they left plenty of evidence all over the place. Also look for any openings into the attic - rodents can get in through amazingly small holes, he should block them up securely. Rats leave a greasy “skid mark” along their walkways - it looks like someone has rubbed scunge in a line, along the wall/pipe/wire/whatever they are running across. Disturbed insulation can be another indicator, rats and squirrels may nest in the stuff, look for signs that something has been tunneling.
County disease vector folks (check with city hall) will probably do a free walkaround of his place, exterior and maybe interior. They’ll be able to point out the possible entryways for critters and they’ll have recommendations for getting rid of the problem (around here it’s things like trim back vegetation at least 4 feet from the roof, check that all vent openings are completely sealed with hardware cloth, etc).
I’m not a pest control expert but I think that the first step should always be to keep them out - block off the entryways, as I mentioned. Make sure that there isn’t any food or water that they are getting into inside the house.
If that doesn’t work then maybe it’s time to call an exterminator - mice are one thing but rats, squirrels, raccoons or other Big Things are another matter. I’m glad I didn’t have to resort to this, I was worried about having dead rats decomposing in my attic.
Mice might be cuter, but they represent the same disease vector as an ugly ol’ rat.
If you hear them, they have come. The phrase “quiet as a mouse” is well founded in truth. What you hear are not mice, but a larger rodent, and probably more than one.
Starlings can do it too. and they are a genuine pain in the ass to get rid of. They do make more noise than an occasional scratching, though.
Ten-to-one you are hearing rats. As I said in the other thread, squirrels are diurnal, and rats are nocturnal. Your noises are coming at night, so probably rats. If if were a raccoon, it sound like a medium sized dog were living in your attic. Rat dropping are about the size of a grain of rice. Look for them-- if you have rats they’ll probably be plentiful. BTW, it’s also possible that you have bats living up there. If you have a damaged screen or opening that would be inaccessible to rats, then maybe it’s bats.
A mouse trap is not big enough to catch a squirrel.
It would be a good idea to check the roof and attic very carefully and seal up any holes of any size - take note of what times you hear the noises and do this when you are as sure as you can be that the critter or critters aren’t up there.
We had a raccoon living in our attic. The hole it had chewed in the soffit to get in was surprisingly small. We tried to trap it, but we think the trap we got from Animal Control wasn’t big enough (we know it was a raccoon because DH took a look up there with a flashlight and saw it in the corner. It said it was quite large). We ended up just sealing up the hole when we were sure it was away (we heard it up there mostly at night) and no more raccoon.
A rat trap will catch a squirrel. I get them all the time. They just push and tug at vent screens under the eaves, where the warm air wafts out in the winter, until they get in.
Or they come down the vent pipes for the same reason, warm scents from the stove hood or heater.
They like peanutbutter. Rat traps are cheap, so save aggravation and put out 2 or 3 at the same time. Don’t stop just because you caught something, but keep setting them out until you don’t catch any more. Then check all the eave and vent screens. If a vent has no screen at all it was pulled off or shoved all the way down. A replacement should be securely affixed.
Here’s what the very competent animal control services did when we had a rat in the attic:
They searched for and sealed up any holes. They employed a small, wiry guy for this, someone who could squirm around into all the narrow corners of our attic. They called him their “jockey”.
They put baited but unset traps around. They said that it was important to let any rats enclosed in the attic get used to the traps first. Apparently rats are phobic of newly-introduced things in their territory and will avoid them at first. The unbaited phase went on for about a week, with evidence of the bait being nibbled out after a couple of days.
They re-baited and then set the traps. Within an hour, bang, a big rat was caught. A guy came by and removed it, leaving the other traps set, but apparently that was our only rodent.
We haven’t heard a rat since, and that was three years ago.
I know this is an old thread, but in case anyone is reading it:
The first question was about how to determine what kind of animal is in the attic. If you hear noises in the daytime, it’s squirrels. At night is rats/mice or raccoon.
Next, it’s very rare to actually spot the animal in the attic. You have to look for the signs they left behind. The best bet is to examine the feces. I have found some websites that show various wild animal feces in the attic.
Finally, the only way to solve the problem is to seal shut the entry holes. You do have to remove the animals
If rats, snap traps
If squirrels, one-way exclusion doors
If raccoons, get the young by hand and trap the mother and relocate them all together
I assume that you mean rabies? At least where I am, animal control seemed fine with us trapping attic raccoons ourselves, but told us very specifically to kill (and not relocate) them, because of that risk.
I successfully live trapped a squirrel in the attic once. I bought a fairly big trap because I didn’t know what I was going to trap but it turned out to be a cute juvenile squirrel. Don’t make the mistake that a lot of people do and just release it close to your property because it will come right back. If it is a rat or mouse, just kill it or find somebody that will.
In this case, I drove it to an area over 10 miles away and released it in the woods. I have no idea if it survived or thrived but that isn’t my problem. I wasn’t the one trying to get free rent and gnawing everything in sight.
I agree that raccoon removal shouldn’t be attempted by amateurs. Wild ones are really just smart mini bears with better hand-eye coordination. You don’t want to confront one of them especially if it has been trapped without the right training and tools.
Vector control sounds like something out of Star Trek. We have pest control over here.
A raccoon trapped without training *and *tools - that would be very dangerous indeed. Amazing how the absence of a couple of commas can alter a meaning…
Not necessarily. Trapping the young “by hand” with the mother nearby is a recipe for disaster in terms of just being attacked. And you’re up in the attic where you probably can’t move around very well.
If I remember correctly, we trapped the mother first. The young were loud enough that we were pretty sure where they were, so we went in from below, by cutting a hole in the ceiling. We approached with caution, wore heavy leather gloves, etc., and it all went without incident. This probably isn’t a beginner’s project, but I don’t think it’s necessarily more dangerous than fixing a steep roof, or working underneath a car, or other work that people often DIY.
In any case, agreed that the original advice was dangerous. Anyone with raccoons should either hire professionals, or carefully understand the risks (with the help of local animal control and others) before proceeding themselves.
DON’T assume daytime noises can’t be rats. I recently was hearing a ton of noise in the day and none at night; I assumed squirrels or birds, but it was rats. This is southern California, so these are roof rats/tree rats/black rats. The daytime noise (and no nighttime noise) is pretty unusual in my experience and sadly I’ve had some. But something may be going on with the rats around here–I just saw a big one running across the yard in the middle of the day, which is unheard of.
