Raccoons are a serious threat to your attic and your property as well as a danger to you, your children and especially your pets. Raccoons are strong and adult males can grow to be larger than a dog. Raccoons are aggressive and vicious. They are the vector species for rabies meaning that when another animal gets rabies it can be assumed it was gotten from a raccoon. The feces of a raccoon contain spores of a deadly parasitic worm that can travel through your bloodstream and enter your brain causing incurable Alzheimer like symptoms that can lead to brain death if not treated early. This spore can become airborne if the feces are dry. Sweeping or cleaning raccoon feces release the spores into the air. This is very dangerous and why raccoon feces is best removed by a professional.
You can tell easily if a raccoon is in your attic by listening for it at specific times. Raccoons are fully nocturnal and sleep during the day so you will not hear them. At night they leave to hunt for food, so you will not hear them. If you listen at dawn and dusk as the sun passes the horizon you will hear the sound of what seems to be a child stomping around in the attic. Only a raccoon can make this kind of noise.
If you have a raccoon in your attic then you are in trouble. Raccoons are not like mice and squirrels. They defecate nearly constantly and their feces is made up of the vilest rotting foods like dead animals and garbage. They will eat anything no matter how rotting because their stomach acid is so strong. They are also destructive chewers and can rip apart entier beams causing your attic and home to become structurally unstable. Not just that, your insulation will become a toilet and if this is happening in the winter you will feel the temperature change. A raccoon in your attic for only a few weeks will destroy most of the insulation and make the attic inefficient and incapable of controlling the temperature in your home.
How can you get the raccoon out? Most would hire a professional wildlife technician but some cannot afford that or simply do not want to pay the price. If you have experience going on roofs then this should be a relatively easy job. You will need steel mesh in a large quantity, a full roll should do. You will want to go up on the roof with nothing first, just a tape measure to measure the holes the animal made. You will want to seal up all but what looks like the main entryway the animal uses. To that, you must attach a one-way door. This device is a cage with two entrances. One is open, that is what you place against your home. The other has a steel frame with a thick plastic door. The door is spring-loaded so it bounces back when opened and is very hard to pull back up. This device will allow the raccoon to leave but stop it from getting back in. This is the most effective way of getting the animal out of your attic.
If the animal is not in your attic but just comes to your property to defecate then there are other things you can do to get it off the property. Make sure to remove any water source the animal could use to get a drink. This is a very big reason wild animals will come to your property as your water tastes a lot better than a puddle. You must also make sure to store your garbage properly. Any food in the yard from a bird feeder to a dirty barbecue will attract a raccoon.
