Don’t leave raccoons alone in your attic to do their dirty work. If you do, you can expect more damage than simple insulation problems.
When any kind of wildlife make a home upstairs, they usually manipulate the insulation to make their nests and in cases like with mice infestations, all the insulation in an attic can be uprooted because of the trails the mice make and what they take for nesting.
If mice infestations go undetected for long periods of time, a homeowner can expect to pay for more than a removal service, but they can expect increases in electricity bills and enough damage done to the attic that a full repair will be necessary.
Our Brampton Call For Unknown Wildlife In Attic
We got called out to Brampton Ontario for an ‘unknown in attic’, which refers to the homeowner hearing noises or seeing signs of wildlife, but not being too sure as to what type of wildlife if any are living in her attic.
When we arrived and obtained more details about her concerns, we quickly started our inspection.
One of the first things we noticed was that the insulation batts were all torn down. When insulation is town down like this it’s usually used by the animal to create a nest. Sometimes other animals who aren’t actually making a home in your attic will simply pay a visit and even take some of the insulation to fix up their nest elsewhere. Raccoons are notorious for destroying insulation in an attic and probably do the most obvious short and long-term damage.
The damage that was done to the insulation was definitely not squirrels, it surely wasn’t bats, but it was clearly raccoons and most likely mice. From the signs we found, we can safely determine that this homeowner had two forms of wildlife living in her attic.
How Do We Know It Was Mice Damage?
If you plan on doing a personal inspection of your attic for mice for example, one surefire way of knowing if they’re there or have been is by looking at the blown insulation. Some of the obvious signs of a mice infestation that you can look out for are trails along the surface of the insulation, bumpy trails along and underneath it, and of course droppings or dead mice.
The video below should you exactly what a trashed attic looks like and if you’re a homeowner you’ll want to avoid this type of damaging completely by setting up a home inspection. As I’ve mentioned many times in the past, a wildlife inspection can save you thousands and even if you don’t know or believe wildlife are living in your home, it’s still worth the inspection in the case that they are.
In most cases, like the case of this homeowner, the damage to her attic wasn’t that bad. All it would take is setting up wildlife prevention, topping up the insulation and straightening it out and getting the batt insulation back in order.