Varmint Invasion Epilogue

[bloodyrosemccoy]

Oh, dang, I forgot to tell y’all about the end of the Varmint Invasion!

So a few days into this fiasco, I noticed a whole lot of scuff marks on the outside of the garage door. It looked like an animal had been scratching at it pretty heavily, but it seemed a little weird to have an animal clawing at the garage door. But then it struck me … the garage door has two positions, and one of them is up.

So we lowered it and went into the garage, looking up at the ceiling above where the scuff marks would be if the door were up.

And there was a big old hole.

So! It may or may not have used the chimney to get in, but judging by the mess inside the hole, this was definitely an entry point. So we have capped the chimney and sealed up the hole, but not before the Varmint Dudes sprayed Raccoon Repellent and Raccoon Poop Neutralizer into both areas.

The soffit we left smashed for a couple of nights, because the mother’s relocation of the baby raccoons took a few nights, and we wanted to be damn sure they were all gone. (We were not hugely worried about her changing her mind and moving back; for one hing, it looked hard enough carrying those little suckers down the mountain. Carrying them back up would be super difficult.) But after a while of inactivity, it was reasonable to assume that was it for raccoons in the attic, and we closed it up again.

I’m glad she managed to relocate with minimal interference from us humans, too. Trapping would be a lot more strenuous on everyone, although the mother might have welcomed a respite from dragging the kids around. So now they’re outside the house, and all is right with the animal/human dynamic again.

Comments

[http://users.livejournal.com/_wastrel/]

Glad to hear that things would have turned out the way they did after all.

[padparadscha.livejournal.com]

We certainly didn't want to kill an animal just tryin' to make it in the world, but a raccoon in the attic can make for quite a mess (and there are even stories of raccoons crashing through ceilings--not fun!), so getting her to relocate rather than spend months raising them in our house was the best option. If that hadn't worked, there are a number of wildlife folks around here who will live-trap adult animals and then remove the babies by hand, so the family can all be released together, but I'd say it's better not to have to completely blow an animal's mind with such an abduction if it can be avoided, no?