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Raccoons are highly intelligent, funny looking, and extremely pesky critters that have a knack for making a mess on your property.  Once they find a source of food at your house they’ll be back regularly to forage.  Unless you enjoy waking up to garbage strewn all over, dead birds, or raccoon droppings on your front lawn; you may want to find a way to control them.  The other concern is that raccoons are wild animals and they may carry infectious diseases, including rabies, which can be a risk to your family or pets.

Some people have tried scaring them off by startling them with loud noises, motion detector lights and water sprayers, or similar tricks.  Unfortunately, these are just a temporary fix.  Eventually the raccoons find a way around them.  Using poisons or pesticides is not a humane way to get rid of raccoons either, and you may end up simply injuring them rather than killing them as you intended.

So how do you get rid of raccoons?  In this case, prevention is the key.  As mentioned before, if they find an easy source of food they will consider it home.  That means you need to seal up your garbage cans or dumpsters tightly.  Remember, raccoons are very intelligent and they have opposable thumbs.  That means they have the ability to open latches or remove loose lids.  Your trash receptacles should therefore be locked down.  It also should go without saying that you don’t want to actively feed them yourself.  They are cute, but encouraging them is just going to get you invaded by a raccoon army.  If you have outdoor pets, you won’t be able to leave their food and water out all night, either.

To prevent raccoons from getting inside your house, be sure to seal off any possible openings.  Even though raccoons are slightly larger than the average house cat, they can fit into small spaces including chimneys, vents, and open seams along baseboards or roofs.  You may need to do some minor, low-cost repairs to your home exterior to ensure you have sealed it off completely.

However, if your problem is not getting better despite all your efforts, you may consider using humane traps to capture the animals without harming them.  You can always contact your local wildlife department and ask them what they recommend for trapping and disposing of pesky raccoons.

For a free Los Angles pest control inspection, give us a call at 888-675-0258 or go to www.accuracypluscalifornia.com