A Bear-y Big Problem

Living in the mountains, there are always wild animals running around our yard, and as long as they stayed in their place and we stayed in ours we had no problem with it.  The problem came when we found raccoons in the walls of our house.  We were watching TV in our upstairs bedroom when all of a sudden we heard a soft thud in the wall between where we were and the room adjacent.  I muted the TV and we sat listening to see if anything else would happen; and sure enough about a minute later we started to hear scratching and climbing.  We waited to see if it would be able to get itself out of the wall or if we’d have to cut it free; luckily within 10 minutes it was up and out of the wall.

Considering this happened late at night I waited until the next day to look around outside and see where it might have been able to gain access to the wall.  I walked around the perimeter and looked up into the eaves and along the soffit to see if I could find any significant gaps or evidence of the raccoon from the wall.  As I came around the back of my house I found a fairly large hole tucked up into a tight corner I wouldn’t be able to get to, but I was sure a raccoon could so I called up a professional wildlife removal company in hopes that they’d be able to seal of the entrance and keep raccoons and other unwanted animals out of my walls.  They picked up and we set an appointment for an inspection the next afternoon.

Now keep in mind, this is early spring we’re talking about; a lot of hibernating creatures are waking up and lingering around looking for food.  When the technician came to the house the next day I walked them through the house and showed them where we heard the raccoon in the wall, then I took him to my bedroom to see where the gap was I found outside my bedroom window.  Since you couldn’t see it very well from the window, he wanted to crawl out onto the roof and get a better look. He sat in the window sill, slid his feet out, stood up, and then froze.  I leaned out to ask if he needed any help, and I froze too.  Standing just below us, out of sight from inside the window, was a black bear, staring right back up at us.  Neither of us wanted to spook it even though we were reasonably out of its reach on the second floor of my home, but we stood still.  After about five minutes of anxious silence, the bear ran back up the hill into the woods.  We finished the inspection, but I think my problem could be much bigger than just a raccoon in the wall.

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