Massachusetts Animal Removal Blog|BatGuys Wildlife Removal LLC

Last week I said goodbye to a cell phone that I’ve had for over 2 years. About a year longer than any girlfriend I’d ever had (with the exception of my wife). Before this phone I don’t think I’ve ever had a cell phone that lasted more than 6 months. This phone however was something special. It was an indestructible phone that was also waterproof. The first week I had this phone my son threw it into a pond and it sank to the bottom in 3 feet of water. I picked up the phone from the bottom of the pond and to my surprise it was working and I was able to use it right away. I’ve dropped this phone off no less than 2 dozen rooftops and even ran it over with my truck. Yet this little warrior kept on plugging. Right up until last Thursday.

Last Thursday I opened my phone to look at my missed call log and I got an error message that read “all calls history empty”. No matter what I did the phone would not show me the calls that I had missed. This is a big deal because during the course of a day I miss a lot of calls. I can’t answer my phone while I’m working on a roof or ladder and I can’t answer it while I’m with a customer either.

So I had to bite the bullet and buy a new cell phone. I bought the exact same phone and hope to get another two years out of this one.

Matt Grady

www.BatGuys.com

I have a feeling that it’s going to be a long winter. As I sit here and type it is 11 degrees with a 25mph wind outside my office. Over the last two weeks we have had several squirrel removal services get delayed due to snow and ice on roofs. All this and it’s not even New Years yet! Historically January and February are the worst months for snow and ice. Usually during these two months we have to put our work on hold because of weather. Jobs often get postponed and at times we are unable to work at all for several weeks at a time. This is all due to the fact that a person cannot safely work on a roof or on a ladder in the ice and snow. Getting a snowstorm in early December rarely happens and I’m betting that we’re in for a snowy winter. I hope I’m wrong.

In the field we have been doing squirrel removal services almost exclusively. Every time we get a really cold day we get bombed with calls for squirrels in attics and rooflines. We’re getting calls for both flying squirrels and also gray squirrels. About a month ago I trapped a black squirrel at a home in Melrose Ma. A wild-looking critter for sure. Black squirrels actually an ordinary gray squirrel with “melanistic” coloring.

I was reading a newspaper article this morning about a pure white squirrel that has been spotted in Whitman Ma. A white squirrel on the other hand is an “albino”. A product of inter-breeding between squirrels of the same family.  As a certified “squirrelologist” I found this rather interesting. For no other reason than after trapping several hundred gray squirrels every year it is nice to see something a little different.

Merry Christmas

Matt Grady

www.BatGuys.com

For the last 2 weeks we have had some issues with our phone lines at BatGuys headquarters. The root of the problem was that our toll free number was not working. If you called it you got a busy signal and that was it. 2 or 3 of our other lines were not working during this time either. I had been working with our phone provider trying to get the issue resolved and finally after about a dozen phone calls we got it fixed. It ended up being a billing issue on THEIR end. Incredible.

So I apologize to anyone that has been trying to contact us and was not able to. Everything is fixed now and there shouldn’t be any more issues.

Matt

I was pleasantly surprised to receive these drawings in the mail last month from one of our recent customers. Like most of the families we work for the this customer’s kids were very interested in their bat problem. They had all types of questions for Mike about what he was going to do to get the bats out of their attic. They wanted to make sure that the bats would not be hurt etc etc. Mike answered all of their questions and evidently made quite an impression on the kids. Mike and I were both very happy to see that they took the time to create these drawings for us and we promised them that we would post them on the BatGuys website for them.

Matt Grady

www.BatGuys.com

About two weeks ago I got a call from a woman in Fall River that asked me if I could come out to remove a boa constrictor from the roof of a house. I politely declined the offer telling her that I don’t deal with snakes and suggested that she call the town animal control officer. Of course the whole time I was on the phone with her I was thinking that she was completely crazy. A boa constrictor on the roof of a 3-story house in Fall River? In October? That’s a good one!

Well you can imagine my surprise a few days later when I was surfing through some local newspaper stories and stumbled across a story about a huge boa constrictor at a home in Fall River. The snake was a pet and somehow got loose from a tenant’s apartment. The snake got into a wall and made it’s way up the the attic of the house. From the attic the snake was able to make it’s way out of an opening near the gutter and was seen soaking up the sun on the South side of the roof for several consecutive days.

Over a period of several days several people tried to capture the snake to no avail. During this period the snake was traveling through the attic and making it’s way up and down the walls of the building. That’s right an 8 foot boa constrictor living in the walls of a house……and my customers freak out over a few bats in their attic??!!! Imagine going to bed at night knowing that this snake was in the walls of your home? ‘

After a few days the homeowner finally caught the snake inside the attic of the house. The article in the newspaper didn’t say exactly HOW he managed to catch it but I can only imagine the tactic that was used.

This was one crazy call that I was wrong about. The lady that called to report the 8 foot snake on the roof in Fall River wasn’t crazy or lying.

Matt Grady

www.BatGuys.com

One of the most common questions that I’m asked by customers is “have you ever been bitten by an animal?” The answer is no, I haven’t. In all the years I have been removing wildlife from people’s homes I have never been bitten by an animal. I’ve come close to getting gouged by raccoons a few times but I’ve always managed to get out of the way.

Two years ago I arrived at a customer’s house to perform a bat inspection and was met at the door by the customer and also his cocker spaniel. The dog was barking and very excited as most dogs usually are. The customer told me “let him sniff your hand and he’ll calm down” So I extended my hand toward the dog’s nose and she lunged forward and bit my hand and would not let go. I finally managed to get my hand out of the dog’s mouth and saw that I had 3 puncture wounds from the dog’s teeth in my thumb. That was the first time I had ever been bitten on the job. By a dog of all things!

Last week Mike joined the dog bite club. In a very similar situation he had a golden retriever take a chunk out of his hand while inspecting a customer’s house for squirrels. A quick thump with the flashlight made the dog let go of his hand. He also had 3 puncture wounds on his hand. Luckily the dog had just had his shots and the customer had the paperwork to prove it.

I find it amusing that we can remove angry gray squirrels by hand and wrestle raccoons in hand to hand combat in attics but the true danger that we face in this business is from our customer’s dogs. Would would have thought?

Matt Grady

www.BatGuys.com

Summer is always a hectic time for the BatGuys. From June 1st through September 1st I juggle a crazy schedule that includes a couple dozen bat calls every single day from people that want everything done ASAP. Add to that spending time with my wife and 3 year old son and also trying to work out every day and there isn’t much time left for anything else.  As soon as the first cold front hits us in early September the bat calls will decrease by over 50% seemingly overnight. That is where we are at now. Things have slowed down quite a bit and I am finding time to get caught up on a lot of things. I regret not having posted more entries in this blog over the summer. Hopefully this will not be the case in the upcoming months.

This summer was about average for us in terms of calls for bats. We did see a dramatic reduction in little brown bats. In previous years we would normall deal with little brown bats in 15-20 houses each year. This year we have only seen little brown bats in 2 homes. This reduction in little brown bats is due to white nose syndrome which has all but wiped out the population of these bats in New England. Thankfully our resident population of big brown bats seems to be doing fine.

We are getting ready for the fall and i’m looking forward to dealing with squirrels and mice again. I don’t have anything against bats but after dealing with them for the last 4 months I could use a change. Once we get the first cold nights where the temperature dips down into the 30’s the calls for gray squirrels, flying squirrels and mice will start to pour in.

I completed my 2nd Pan Mass Challenge back at the beginning of August. Once again my family and I had a great time at this event and I had a great ride. The PMC is something that I will always be a part of. Once you have done it once it is very hard not to continue doing it. I’ll have a page complete with pictures and a story posted here shortly.

I’ll be updating my blog on a weekly basis so check back soon.

Matt Grady

www.BatGuys.com

We often use text messaging to communicate between ourselves while working in the field. When this first started a couple years ago I couldn’t help but feel like a teenager doing it but at the same time I found it very effective. We use it mainly for simple messages that aren’t worth a phone call. Things like “bring me a coffee”, “got bit by a squirrel, bring bandaids”, “this customer is a lunatic, he locked me inside his attic” and things of that nature.

Two weeks ago Mike was working on a house in Upton Ma. The town of Upton is the worst town in our area for cell phone reception. In 90% of the town you can’t get a shred of reception. While he was working on this house he couldn’t make or receive any calls on his phone. However he did have just enough reception to send and recieve text messages.

I had sent him a text message asking him if hehad called his 3pm appointment to let the woman know that he was going to be15 minutes late. He told me that he forgot to call her before he lost reception but don’t worry because “I sent her a text message”. I had to laugh, I said “you did what? you sent a customer who we haven’t even met a text message?” He simply said that he had no choice.  I asked him how she reacted to receiving a text message from the animal removal guy and he said that she responded to the text message, thanked him for contacting her and never mentioned it again.

At first I thought sending a customer a text message was a bit unprofessional but I guess not.The customer didn’t mind at all and all was well. With that said we’re not going to make a habit out of sending text messages to our customers but it’s nice to know that we can if we have to. I just thought it was funny how the customer wasn’t surprised or taken back by it at all.

Matt Grady

www.BatGuys.com

This past week we switched phone companies at our office. This may sound simple but it turned out to be quite a project. Trying to coordinate the switching of phone numbers from one company to another was very frustrating. It took about 40 phone calls, 3 dozen emails and even a few faxes. As a result the phone system at our office was down for Thursday afternoon, all day Friday and all day Saturday as well. If you called during that time you either got a busy signal or a “this number is not in service” message. I apologize for any inconvenience that this may have caused. As of right now all our phones are back up and running.

In the field we’re seeing very large colonies of bats in the last few weeks. We’re also seeing juvenile bats in several different stages of development. This presents a very tricky situation. You must proceed with caution when doing any type of bat removal service this time of year. Being able to detect the prescence of a maternal bat colony inside of a structure is a skill that very few people have.

Calls for raccoons have started to dwindle as this year’s juvenile coons are now very large and traveling on their own. Just last week I found myself chasing 4 juvenile raccoons in a 110 degree attic.

I’ve also been training for this year’s Pann Mass Challenge. I haven’t had much time to ride but I have been running or doing some type of cardio just about every day. I did 70 miles on my road bike last weekend and felt really good. I’m planning on doing 4-5 more training rides on my road bike and i’m not worried about being physically ready for the ride. However with the recession and our country’s current economic crisis i’m finding that fundraising has been harder than in year’s past. I’m not doing very well to date and could really use some support. If you are able to put a few doallars towards a very worthy cause you can donate here - BatGuys 2009 PMC

Matt Grady

www.BatGuys.com

Since my last post (been way too long!) spring has arrived across our service area. I have evicted several female raccoons with juveniles from both chimneys and attics in the last 3 weeks.This year’s juvenile squirrels are now mobile and are big enough to leave the attic and forage on their own. These little guys have been showing up in our traps for the last 2 weeks or so. Calls for bats have also started to come in since the last blast of warm weather. Overall it seems like it’s a “late spring”. What I mean by that is-  this year’s juvenile critters seem to have been born a few weeks later than normal.

As I mentioned in my last post I am riding in this year’s 2009 Pan Mass Challenge again. I have been training every day as I have been for months and despite a couple nagging injuries things are going well. I haven’t actually got on my bike yet (next week) but I have been running several miles each day and also training with weights. I’m planning on doing just 7-8 training rides this year. Last year I probably did 3 times as many training rides andgot a little burnt out. I enjoy cycling but i’d rather ride a mountain bike.

In the last 3 weeks i’ve lost two friends to cancer. My uncle Eddy died two weeks ago after a 5-6 year battle with the disease. Then last Saturday a member of a fishing organization that I belong to, John Grzesiak also died of cancer at the age of 34! The purpose of this ride really hits home when something like this happens. I have plenty of motivation to kick ass on this ride but to lose 2 people close to me within 3 weeks makes me angry.

Visit my PMC Page and use the EGIFT button in the right-hand column to donate to my fundraising campaign and help me kick cancer’s ass.

Matt Grady

www.BatGuys.com