Woodpeckers

Woodpeckers In Utah

Leave a comment

woodpecker_damage2We are going out of our mind, furious about the woodpeckers destroying our house.  It’s one of those situations that starts out mildly annoying, and then grows into a much bigger problem as we just tried to ignore the issue.  My husband and I built this home in Utah in 2001, and we built it in one of those beautiful Utah towns that’s close enough to Salt Lake City, but far enough away for that country feel.  In fact, we’re close to a bird sanctuary and wet lands, so we’ve loved the variety of wildlife we get to see right in our own yard.  Usually.

A few years ago, we were woken by a knocking on the outside wall.  We looked out and were at first charmed to see a beautiful woodpecker perched on our stucco siding.  Then, we watched it as it drilled a hole right into the stucco.  We chased it off, only to have it return several more times that day.  Since then, it’s been a nightmare.  Every single year, at least two woodpeckers descend on our home.  We spray for bugs, and not one of our neighbors has a woodpecker problem, just us.  Lucky us.

My husband keeps a BB gun around just to scare them off.  We’ve put up the fake owl.  We’ve decorated the back of our house with ugly pie tins and old CDs (thanks for nothing, Pinterest).  Nothing has scared them off.  They just keep coming.  We put off repairing the stucco until we could figure out how to get rid of the woodpeckers for good.  Big mistake.  Now we have water damage on the inside of our walls thanks to those irritating woodpeckers.  I’m scared of going into the attic space, because I’m wondering what bugs or other critters have come in through those woodpecker holes.  And, I still have absolutely no idea what’s attracting those woodpeckers to our house anyway.  Plus, woodpeckers in Utah, like all wild birds with the exception of a few, are protected under federal laws.  So, we can’t kill ‘em, much as we’d like to.

I’m at my wit’s end.  Tired of hearing the bold woodpeckers destroying my house.  Sick of worrying about water damage from woodpecker holes.  And, I hate having to repair the walls just to have the woodpeckers come back and cause more damage.  Time to bring in the professionals, because I’m about ready to actually aim that BB gun right on those birds, laws or no laws, and I’m not paying fines or risking prosecution for woodpeckers!

Rat, Rats

Rats!!

Leave a comment

rats1We get a lot of questions about rats.  What do rats like to eat?  Why are rats in my home?  What do rat droppings look like?  How do I get rid of rats?

 

Roof rats, Norway rats, black rats, pack rats, kangaroo rats, naked mole rats, cotton rats.  Not all creatures called “rats” are actually of the rat family, but when you’re dealing with a rat infestation, you probably don’t care what type of rat you have, you just want them gone.  Unfortunately, different types of rats behave differently, which means that you need to know what kind of rats are breeding around you so that you can most effectively get rid of them.  That’s one real advantage to having a rat catcher / wildlife removal expert.  With a little investigation, they can tell what kind of rats are infesting your house or building, and they have the expertise and tools to get rid of that particular type of rat.

 

Rat teeth are constantly growing, so a rat must continually gnaw on things to keep them a manageable size.  Combine that need with strong teeth and powerful jaw muscles, and rats can chew through pretty much anything, including concrete and lead pipes.  A rat can bite with the force of 12 tons per square inch (a great white shark bites with 20 tons per square inch.)  Ouch!!  So, once rats are in a building or a home, anything is fair game for gnawing.  Wood joists, wires, boxes, soffit, pretty much any building material and personal property.

 

Rats will eat pretty much anything and gnaw on everything. They are opportunistic feeders, which means if they can get at it, they’ll eat it.  Grains, meat, fish, seeds, fruit, snails, insects, pet food, leather, fur and other rodents.  Keeping lids tight on garbage cans, getting rid of bird feeders, and cutting off access to gardens and food storage will all help limit a rat’s access, but they’re quite capable of climbing, jumping and chewing their way in if they’re determined.  Allstate Animal Control has a slick rodent barrier that prevents rodents from digging under a fence and climbing up fences, trees or telephone posts to gain access to a food source.

 

Rat droppings are compact black pellets that look very much like a bean or raisin.  Their droppings usually measure about ¼ to ¾ of an inch long, and are usually found in their traffic areas, outside the structure, by window wells, window ledges, or access holes.

 

Rats can get into a home through a tiny opening.  Holes left by woodpeckers, openings around pipes, a weak soffit or other roofing material are excellent access points for rats, and you may notice the entryway is black and greasy from a rat’s body oils.  Finding and sealing one opening, though, may not be enough.  They will likely have more than one entrance point.  Again, a professional rat trapper can inspect your building or home, locate and seal up these little holes.

 

Picking up a few traps at a hardware store and setting them around heavily trafficked areas is definitely an option for homeowners, but since rats are such prolific breeders, it’s likely you have more rats in the walls or attic or under the floor than you can see or catch.  Rat poison is another option, but introduces possible harm or even death to children or animals who get overly curious. Also, rats are smart and learn to quickly avoid most poisons set out for them.  Keep in mind that rats pack a painful bite, carry diseases (sometimes fatal diseases), and get very feisty and ornery when cornered.  The absolute best way of getting rid of rats is to have a professional trapper come out to your building.  They have the expertise, the tools and the experience to find out which kind of rat you’re dealing with, use the most effective methods of exterminating rats or trapping rats or killing rats, and do what is needed to keep rats from coming back.

Raccoons

Football Player Kills Raccoon with Wrench

Leave a comment

Nebraska football player Jack Gangwish tried to take a selfie with a raccoon he spotted on the side of the road, so he pulled over and approached the raccoon, camera at the ready.  From the raccoon’s perspective, a giant defensive end just came at it, so it did what it thought it needed to do, and that was bite the football player in the calf.  Unfortunately, a raccoon bite means the raccoon must be tested for rabies, and the only way to do that is to kill the raccoon and send it to a lab for testing.  As Gangwish said, “It was death by crescent wrench.”  Talk about a selfie going horribly, horribly wrong!  PETA is now getting involved, saying Gangwish should be punished for animal cruelty.

 

Pigeons

Pigeon Poop

Leave a comment

pigeon_crap375 gallons of pigeon droppings?  Yep.  Twice a year, some unlucky parking garage employee in a Fairbanks, Alaska garage gets the job of cleaning up after the pigeons that roost in and around the garage.  The hazmat suit is donned, special hazardous waste material bags are used, and about 75 gallons of pigeon poop is scooped up.  According to some government reports, one pigeon produces up to 25 pounds of poop every year.  Now, multiply that by however many pigeons are roosting in and around your business, garage, office building, apartments, home or outbuilding!  And, it’s not just gross to look at.  It’s corrosive!  Pigeon droppings are acidic enough that it eats through concrete, wood or metal joists, weakening a structure, defacing buildings, and ruining property.  So, not only does it weaken the structure of a building, but it’s heavy enough to weigh it down and cause serious damage.  When you weigh the pros and cons of ways of dealing with a pigeon problem, you need to also consider the cost of repairing joists, re-facing the building, re-pouring concrete.  A professional bird remover will not only get rid of the roosting pigeons, but will clean up pigeon droppings and sanitize the area, as well as install materials that will keep pigeons out of your building.  It’s well worth it to have an expert take care of the pigeon problem once and for all instead of dealing with the problem year after year after year.

Raccoons

Trappers Love Wild Animals

Leave a comment

As a wildlife control company, sometimes people assume we don’t like wild animals.  We’re a network of trappers, aimed at removing wild animals from properties and away from people.  Truth is, we know a great deal about all types of wild animals that come into contact with humans on a regular basis.  From rats to raccoons, opossums to armadillos, groundhogs to ground squirrels, coyotes, bobcats or feral hogs.  It’s our job to know these animals, what causes their run-ins with humans, what attracts them to our properties, what their life cycles are like, how they raise their young, and what kind of damage they can do.  The more we know about these animals, the better we are at removing them.  The more we know, the more we love these animals, too.  But, our main goal is protecting people, their pets, their businesses, and their properties.  So, we handle wild animals problems with an eye toward protecting your health, safety and property while still taking care of the wild animals as humanely as possible, according to all local and federal laws.  Sometimes, the animals, such as rats or mice, must be killed.  Releasing them into the wild only displaces the problem elsewhere, for other people to have to deal with.  Sometimes, we are able to release a wild animal, such as a family of raccoons, back into nature, far away from human habitation.  We know the kind of diseases these wild animals can transmit to humans.  We know the harm they cause when they attack people, pets or domestic animals.  And, it’s our job to remove wild animals and keep them from harming you, your family, your pets and your property.

Bats

Competitive Bats

Leave a comment

Bat (2)Discover magazine just released an article discussing how bats are pretty competitive against each other.  They’ll send jamming signals to steal a rivals’ prey.  Bats, just before snapping their bug meal out of the air, will sometimes send out a series of rapid chirps so they can better home in on their target.  Lately, scientists have discovered nearby bats will sometimes send out ultrasonic jamming signals to confuse the hunting bat just so they can steal the bug for their own meal.

Pigeons

Hawks Vs Pigeons

Leave a comment

pigeon_trap4Hawks are seen as the pigeon prevention method for a mansion awaiting reconstruction in Ewell, United Kingdom.  City officials worry about pigeons roosting in the building that was damaged by fire in December 2013.  Pigeon droppings will damage the plaster and pose a health and safety risk to the crews scheduled to start the restoration work after Christmas.  The temporary solution?  Fly hawks over the mansion at dusk each night in hopes of scaring off any pigeons, preventing them from roosting there.  If that doesn’t work, they will need to consider more permanent solutions to keep the pigeons out.

Bats

Bat Management

Leave a comment

bat_caughtOf all the different ways to manage bat problems, one town in Australia is trying to discourage bats from roosting in neighborhoods by allowing residents to seriously trim back the trees lining city streets.  The hope is they will deter the bats from living in the trees and encourage them to move to a more suitable location in the wild.  Unfortunately, they may discover that the bats may end up moving into attics, chimneys, walls or eaves instead of seeking shelter in a more natural setting.

Bats aren’t the truly terrifying creatures that swarm around people’s heads or go for blood.  But, their presence in our homes, apartments, office buildings, out buildings and industrial spaces aren’t good for them and it’s certainly not good for us.  The mess they make with guano (or bat droppings) is smelly, foul, and attracts other vermin or bugs.  They can carry ticks or mites that drop off and infest the area.  They damage walls, soffits, eaves and other building materials, and leave a large greasy smudge around the areas where they access the building.  And, yes, they are a common carrier of rabies.  The problem is, their teeth are so small that a person may not even know they’ve been bitten.  So, health officials strongly suggest you never touch a bat with your bare hands, and if a person wakes up in a room with a bat, they should seek medical attention immediately.  Rabies is fatal unless managed properly, so don’t take a chance around bats.

Raccoons

Let’s Talk Rabies

Leave a comment

Yawning-Raccoon

Of all the wild animal diseases, rabies is probably the best known, but it is usually a misunderstood disease.  Rabies is transmitted through the saliva of an infected animal, usually through a bite.  It can affect all mammals, not just raccoons, skunks, dogs and cats.  Recently, a rancher had to put down his cow that had been bitten by a rabid wild animal, and the cow tested positive for rabies.  Domestic animals and people with high-risk jobs (like trappers who remove wild animals from homes and other buildings) can receive vaccinations.  Domestic animals who are known to have been exposed to a rabid animal are required to either be placed in 6 month quarantine, at the owner’s expense, or must be euthanized.  People who have been exposed to a rabid animal must receive a series of rabies shots, which are quite costly, around $5,000 to $7,000.  There is no cure for rabies.  It’s a viral disease that attacks the nervous system, and is always fatal unless treated in a timely manner.  Symptoms can take as much as a year to present, which means a person who was bitten or scratched by a rabid animal must be treated immediately, even if they aren’t suffering any symptoms, yet.  As many as 50,000 people die every year from rabies.  7,000 to 8,000 rabid animals are found to have rabies each year in the United States, with more than 90% occurring in wild animals.  The actual numbers may be much higher than that, however, since the only way to confirm rabies is by killing the animal and testing the carcass.  Human deaths from rabies are rare in the United States, but they do happen when someone either doesn’t know they have been bitten by a rabid animal, or they fail to seek proper medical care.  Bats in the United States have very small teeth, and can bite a sleeping person without the person knowing.  This is why health officials recommend seeking medical attention if a person wakes up with a bat in the room.  They may have been bitten as they were sleeping.

Rabies is, of course, not the only disease that can be transmitted to humans, pets or other domestic animals from wild animals.  Diseases can be transmitted through the urine or feces of animals and birds, and animals can carry parasites and other bugs that can infest an area where they are living, which in turn cause harm or illness to people.  This is why it is so important to have a professional wildlife animal control company send a crew to remove the wild animals from your home, outbuildings, industrial buildings, offices, or anywhere else in or on your property.  It is healthier and safer for you and the wild animals to have them out of your property and back in their own habitat.