BATS!

The folks I do alot of my work for have had bats living in their roof for some time. We knew about em when we re-sided their house this winter. And knew we'd need to deal with them come spring...
Well, spring's here, and now the bats are stinkin up their master bedroom somethin fierce. Need to get em out ASAP!!

My question is HOW???

Don't really want to kill em, and end up dealing with stinky dead bats in adition to stinky bat chit...

There's no access to the space they are in, short of tearing the roof off. It's just a rafter-framed roof.

Would like to encourage them to vacate, then seal up their entrance...

Have done some online research, but lookin for first hand experience...

Thanks for any advice!!

Ben

no first hand, but on one of those tv exterminator shows, i think it was billy the exterminator, they has a fine net they put over the opening where the bats were going in and out of. made the net like a funnel. when the bats came out at night to feed, they would slide down the net and out the funnel, and then couldnt get back in. after they were all out, they sealed up the hole. be careful bats can carry lots of diseases. wear a respirator.

I've heard where there are laws that you can't move or block off their home during much of the year. I have always been afraid of having them move in the attic just because of the headache that it is to get them stopped. There are always millions of them, they make a horrible mess, and they have set up shop PERMANENTLY! Get some help who knows the rules.

I have 2 bat houses in my shop. I will put up with the guano in exchange for them killing the skeeters!!

Try to notice where thy are entering the house and put a picture of Lyle or rusted up. That oughta scare them off for good.......

Ok, here is what you do. Find the hole where they come and go. Hang a 5 gallon bucket 1/4 full of water right below hole. When a bat comes out to feed at dusk he will fall before he gets his wings open. He will fall in the bucket. Go up in morning and dump the bats out. Hang bucket with water back up for next night and repeat until you get no bats in bucket. Might take 4 or 5 nights. When you get no more bats go up after dusk when any you may have missed are out feeding and take bucket down and patch the hole. I did this in the house I used to live in. The first night I got about 70 bats in the bucket. About made me sick when I saw them. Next night I got maybe 20. Third night maybe 3 or 4. Following night maybe 3 or 4 again. Then one and finally none for about 3 days in a row. That is when I took it down and patched the hole. Never a bat in the house for years after that. You might think you will never find there hole but you will. Just go around the roof edge looking carefully at any crack or suspicious opening. You will find it. This method absolutely works.

Presuming that you just want them out, where i've
got no ideas....BUT...here in Wisconsin..if the
DNR foud out that somebody was drowning them by the dozens..they'rd be a BIG NASTY fine $$$$$.

I'd prefer to not kill them. In fact I spent part of yesterday building bat houses, so they will have a new place to stay when the evacuate... They are great for bug controll, but the lady of the house mentioned something about "They smell so bad I may just burn the house down!" She was kidding, but we need to get them out ASAP.

Ben

most times exclusion would be proper but only after any young ones have reached a certain age.

I bought a old cement block build. that was full of bats. the former owner said they had tried everything and nothing worked. One evening I went in and on one of the walls, the bats were so thick on the wall that you could not see the white wall in about a 10 by 10 foot area. When I turned on the lights, it was just like slow motion, they moved from side to side in the large group and slowly went above the roof decking threw a very tiny knot hole. I then discovered they were staying above the wood roof deck but under the flat tar roof where it curved up along the side parapet walls. I then watched the next night and about dark they started flying out of a tiny crack in the block wall. I stopped counting at 500 but it was a steady stream for quite awhile of them leaving. I then followed a friends advice and heated up a 6 inch lenght of PVC pipe that I could slip in the hole with a slight grade or slope down and then cut the toes out of a ladies knee high hose and tied over the end of the PVC. As mentioned in another post, they would drop out of the hose before there wings opened and then the next morning could not get the hose back open to re enter. After about a week to make sure they were all gone, I sealed the hole and that was about 8 years ago and have not had a problem since.