Tips for Addressing Bat Problems In Your Home or Building

Bats roosting and flying around are the last thing anyone wants in their home. They’re annoying and can cause real damage to your homes, furnishings, and possessions. Some pests such as bats can even cause allergic reactions or carry diseases.

Even though the bat is unlikely to cause any direct problems for the occupants in your home, the presence of a bat in your home can cause a whole host of other problems – and that’s why it’s so important to take action before the problem gets out of hand.

If there are bats in your house or building, it’s only a matter of time before their waste begins to pose a serious problem. Bat droppings and urine can actually destroy wood and other building materials, gradually compromising the structural integrity of your home.

In this article, we have listed down some helpful tips for addressing bat problems in your home or building.

Assess the Bat Problem First

Knowing the facts about bats is the first tip you need for addressing a bat infestation in your building or house since there is a lot of misinformation about bats. With that being said, here are some tips on how to assess a bat infestation in your home:

Know the bat basics

It’s best to know what kind of bat you’re dealing with. Eviction and exclusion can be based on identification of species in a structure, timing and techniques.

Know where are the bats roosting

Know whether the bats are inside the building or under the roofing or another structure on the outside of the building. Bats can roost in a variety of building structures including under shingles, siding, fascia boards, flashings, and rafters, in cracks of chimneys and walls, behind shutters, or under porches.

Determine whether it is a night roost

The presence of a night roost does not necessarily indicate that bats are inside the building and the limited use of a night roost is not usually a problem.

Night roosts are places that bats use temporarily during the night to rest between feeding bouts. Night roosts are often open spaces, including under bridges, arches above doors, covered patios, and carports. 

Determine whether the bat eviction is necessary

Some bats live in buildings, and there’s no reason to evict them if there is little chance for contact with people.

To assess whether bat exclusion is required, work with the homeowner to identify the problems that the bats are creating such as noise, odor or guano accumulation.

Identify And Seal Entry and Exit Points for Bats

Generally, it is not unusual for bats to find the easiest entry point for quick entry and exit when they are feeding. So here are some helpful tips on how to prevent bats from entering your house or building:

1. Locate the bats’ entry point to your home and seal the opening with a one-way valve or tube.
2. Cut off that entry point and they may just be forced to find elsewhere to roost, leaving your home bat free and protected from unwanted interlopers.
3. The most common entry spots include attic vents and windows, spaces in between wood frames, and through holes caused by damage or age. 
4. These can often be hidden or obscured to the casual observer, and so it may be a good idea to have a pest professional take a look and determine where the bats are making their entrance. 
5. Seal off access and keep bats from ever getting inside your home. Just be sure there are no stragglers left inside before you close off the exit.

Safely Clean Bat Droppings And Any Remnants

Due to their potential for spreading disease, it is essential to maintain proper hygiene standards when cleaning up and disposing of any bat droppings or carcasses you find at roosting sites. Extended periods of bat fecal buildup often require sanitation, removal, and replacement of attic insulation before an area is safe to enter again. 

While bats themselves can often carry diseases like rabies, the most dangerous risks from having bats in your home come from their droppings, which can host a wide variety of dangerous (and even deadly) diseases and parasites. 

Additionally, bat guano can even contain Histoplasmosis, which can cause serious respiratory infections in humans, and bats themselves can carry blood-sucking bugs that can attack and infect humans nearby. So in order to sanitize your space where bats spent time, you can do it yourself in a secure and safe manner or you could hire an experienced pest professional.

If you don’t act on the bat issue, it is unlikely to disappear on its own. By taking action, you can remove bats from your home or building safely and completely without causing harm to the animals or yourself. For more information on how to manage pests at home, visit Pest Guide today.

Locate And Remove All Bats

For some homeowners, the encounter will be a one-time occurrence involving a young bat who was in the wrong place at the wrong time. In other instances, the problem may be more extensive and require a more nuanced approach. 

However, if bats are already causing problems, an immediate eviction may be required. So here are some useful tips in getting rid of bats from your house or building in a humane way:

• Fill up holes and seal cracks
• Use a natural bat repeller
•  Install a bat net
• Install a decoy bat house
• Remove food sources from your garden
• Implement a bat cone bat deterrent
• Install bright lights
• Use mothballs
• Scare them with sound
• Play with temperature
• Hang aluminum foil
• Install a mirror
• Use essential oils or Phenol
• Call a professional bat exterminator

Avoid Contact With The Bats

Finding a bat in your house can be a frightening experience, but in reality, the bat is likely more scared than you are in that particular situation. In fact, bats always try to avoid contact with humans and other animals. It means that it is perfectly natural for bats to fly around at dusk as they forage for flying insects. 

Here are some tips on how to avoid direct contact with bats in case you need an immediate course of action in ridding them and what to do if you encounter a contact.

• A bat should never be handled with bare hands. You could be bitten by it if it felt threatened, just like any other animal. Bats do not bite unless they are provoked. Even the occasional rabid bat seldom becomes aggressive.
• Since bats are a rabies vector species in most places and, like all wild animals, can bite to defend themselves, it is crucial to take all necessary precautions to avoid a potential exposure to the virus. 
• Because bats groom themselves regularly and rabies can be transmitted through saliva, touching a bat with bare hands that have a wound, abrasion, or scratch is considered a potential exposure to the virus. 
• In case of an emergency in which a bat must be handled, handlers should always use thick gloves and a towel to gently gather up the bat. The bat should be placed inside a box with a secure lid until help can be found.
• In any encounter with a bat, stay calm and keep children and animals away.
• Try to catch the bat in a net or cover it with a wide-mouthed jar or plastic tub and gently work a piece of cardboard between the container and the surface from which the bat is hanging.
• You can capture a bat on the floor with a towel. Gather the towel up very gently, take the animal outside, and open the towel in a place where the bat will be safe even if he or she doesn’t fly immediately. Wear thick gloves—never use your bare hands.
• When a bat is found outside that may be injured, grounded by a storm or pesticides, or ill, a bat rehabilitator or wildlife rehabilitator should be contacted for assistance.

Get In Touch with Pest Guide Today!

If you don’t act on the bat issue, it is unlikely to disappear on its own. By taking action, you can remove bats from your home safely and completely without causing harm to the animals or yourself.

However, if you’re struggling with a bat problem, it’s best to get in touch with experienced bat removal professionals. Visit Pest Guide to learn more about bats and other pests causing problems in your home. Additionally, there are also helpful guides, articles, product reviews, and other resources that can help you solve your bat problem.