Bat Exclusion Services — September 15, 2006

Bat Removal and Exclusion Services

The past month has been pretty much bats, bats, and more bats. We have been spending every day on roofs and on ladders performing bat exclusion services. For those that are not familiar with the term a bat exclusion is basically a bat-proofing service. We bat-proof the exterior of a house sealing off all gaps larger than 1/4 inch. On the area that the bats are using to come and go, the main entry-point we install a device called a bat-valve. The bat-valve is basically a one-way door that allows bats to get out but not back in. Once they exit the house (as they do every night) the bats are not able to get back into their usually entry-point and cannot get back in anywhere else on the house because we have already sealed all other openings and bat-proofed it.

A woman in Quincy MA discovered a bat flying around her bedroom during the middle of the night. She very bravely followed the bat to the kitchen where it landed on her table and sat motionless. She grabbed a wine glass from her cupboard and dropped it over the bat. She then placed her phone book over the trapped bat and duct-taped it to the table to make sure that the bat wouldn't be able to get out from under the glass. You might have thought she had a lion under there! This wins the award for the most creative bat-control method we've encountered this year. She also has a great sense of humor and gave me permission to post this here. We didn't think still pictures were enough to fully illustrate this, so we created a short video too.

Arlington Bat Removal and Exclusion

A Bat Swimming in a toilet. This was a first for me. I have found several dead in toilets but none that were alive. Watch a quick video of the swimming bat here.

Massachusetts Bat Exclusion

The first picture above is the view of a gable-vent from inside the attic. This vent had layers of screening and the bats were roosting between the layers. The white rag above the vent is some kind of a bat-repellant contraption. As you can tell by the pictures it works great! The second picture is the same vent from the outside of the house after I removed the blades of the vent. Watch a video of these bats exiting this vent and see me getting stung by a bee!

Rhode Island Bat Exclusion

During a recent inspection in Newport RI I found piles of bat guano under the fiberglass insulation in the attic. I then removed the three bats in the picture from under a patio umbrella on the homeowners deck. Oddly enough, these bats stayed on the ground like this for over an hour before flying away. Once again proving that bats are very strange animals.

Massachusetts Attic Cleanout

Although the heat has been almost unbearable we did complete one attic cleanout project in the last month and the heat almost killed us. Check out our attic cleanout page for more information.