Removing Raccoons From Your Home in Winter

As winter takes hold, it’s not just people who look for warm, comfy places to seek shelter in, so do many small animals. Raccoons are among those looking for a suitable place to den. Contrary to popular belief, these masked bandits don’t hibernate in the winter, but they do look for a good place to hunker down and wait out the worst of the cold weather. This makes raccoon removal a year-round job for Durham companies like Skedaddle Humane Wildlife Control Services. In the wild, raccoons will make their winter dens in the hollows of tree trunks to keep them safe from predators. In the urban jungle, your snug, well-insulated house can provide them with the ideal winter base. Your attic, chimney, storage shed, or any other seldom used area of your home, is a tempting place for a raccoon to den. This means that even in the winter you need to be vigilant and on the lookout for any signs of raccoon activity, like strange noises coming from your attic at night. If you suspect a raccoon has taken up residence in your Durham home, you need to contact a raccoon removal specialist immediately.

Surviving the Winter

Raccoons don’t hibernate and they don’t store food. So how do they survive the winter? In late fall the raccoon's fur thickens into a heavy winter coat and they gobble as much food as they can lay their little paws on. They eat and eat to gain weight and then survive off these fat stores in the winter. They may not be hibernating, but they are pretty much inactive. In severe cold, they can enter a state of torpor. This slows their metabolism and lowers their body temperature, allowing their stored resources to last as long as possible. [caption id="attachment_16292" align="aligncenter" width="630"] Raccoons stay active throughout the winter months.[/caption]

Raccoon Damage

You might think that having an inactive raccoon, or two, in your house for the winter is not really a major problem, but actually, it is. Raccoons can damage your property by tearing up insulation, chewing wires and making holes in the roof. Besides the cost of repairing any property damage, frayed wires are a major fire hazard. Raccoons can also carry diseases, like rabies, and their urine and feces put your family’s health at risk.

Mating Season

Raccoons may be inactive during the coldest months, but they don’t stay quiet for long. When mating seasons starts you will have a real problem on your hands. A sleeping raccoon is one thing, a mating raccoon is a whole different story. They are guaranteed to keep you awake at night with their nocturnal activities, and before you know it you will have a litter of kits (baby raccoons) sharing your home with you. Safely removing one raccoon from your Durham house is relatively quick and easy for a raccoon removal expert but a whole litter is far more challenging.

Safe, Humane Raccoon Removal is the Only Answer

As soon as you notice any raccoon activity in or around your home, like paw prints in the snow, noise in the attic or damage to your roof, you need to act. It is far better to call in the raccoon removal experts to remove one or two raccoons that have made your home their home for the winter than to call them out in the spring to deal with an entire litter. Skedaddle Humane Wildlife Control services are the perfect people to take care of raccoon removal in Durham. We will send a technician to your home to perform a safe, humane, hands-on removal. Once we have removed any raccoons from your home we will do a property inspection to identify any damage and locate raccoon entry points.  We can then secure your home to prevent any further raccoon intrusions.