Gone are the days when raccoons are treated as mere parts of the wildlife landscape. These days, they seem to be everywhere. Raccoons are a tricky bunch, and they are intelligent enough to adapt themselves right into houses.

Once they leave their natural habitat, they instinctively seek out shelter and food, and establish their dens in places where they have access to both. Their favorite places to stay are dark, warm, and spacious, such as attics and crawl spaces.

A Raccoon is a Reason for Concern

Raccoons are furry nocturnal animals, and they actively seek out food at night. They seriously cause problems even to people who are trying to sleep just because of the noises and nuisance they make at night.

Aside from the noise, these animals could cause structural damage to your home as they try to enter it and turn it into their own home. They also carry diseases that can be easily transferred to people and pets.

If encountered, they can become aggressive and will scratch and bite those who they think will do them harm. Charming.

Diseases Carried by Raccoons

There are many health risks involved whenever there is a presence of raccoons inside a home. If you suspect you have one frequenting your home, here are some of the diseases that you and your loved ones could possibly contract:

Roundworm

Roundworm eggs come from raccoon feces, and are called baylisascaris.

Since these eggs are small and slight, they become airborne and could easily be transmitted into people who are also living inside the home, even if they have not had any direct contact with the raccoon.

Some symptoms from roundworm are fever, tiredness, loss of vision, and coma.

Rabies

A raccoon’s bite or scratch can cause rabies which could severely affect the victim’s central nervous system and cause brain inflammation.

Rabies can be deadly, and there have been confirmed cases of death resulting from rabies that came from a raccoon. If bitten by a raccoon, the symptoms you should watch out for are anxiety, aggression, high fever, hallucinations, and seizures.

Leptospirosis

Leptospirosis is transmitted to people and pets who come into contact with raccoon urine. If one of your household pets has a jaundiced yellow color in the whites of the eyes, then he or she may be suffering from leptospirosis.

Among humans, leptospirosis can cause high fever, body pain, vomiting, and diarrhea. If left untreated, it could lead to even more serious diseases such as meningitis and liver failure.

Salmonella

Salmonella bacteria can be found in raccoon droppings. The resilient nature of the bacteria allows it to stay dormant in the feces for a long time—even if the droppings are not so fresh anymore.

Some of the symptoms observed are fever, diarrhea, abdominal pains, and a weakened immune system.

Raccoon Prevention

It will only be half the solution if all you do is spring a trap, catch, and exterminate a raccoon and then leave it there. After all, what’s to stop another animal from moving in?

In order to successfully remove raccoons from your house for good, it is imperative that you figure out first how they managed to enter your premises. A thorough inspection all over your house is needed in order to determine how they found a way in.

Once you have established the raccoon’s entryways, you need to seal them off using a wire mesh or a metal flashing. This will prevent these pesky animals from entering again.

During cleanup, necessary precautions will have to be made when handling the droppings the raccoon has left behind, and you must also remove the materials it has been in contact with during its stay in your home.

Raccoon removal can be a very difficult task, but a necessary one that should be done immediately, as prolonged exposure to raccoons in your own home could lead to harmful diseases.

For the safety of your family members, and to achieve peace of mind that comes with the knowledge that your home remains a pest-free haven, you need to get rid of these animals.

Seeking the help of a professional pest control company like Dugas Pest Control will bring the solution you need. We have years of experience removing wildlife from homes, and we take your families’ safety as our utmost priority. Get in touch with us today to be rid of these pests once and for all!

In the United States, there are several animals that are known as pest species due to their very nature. For high incidence of contact with humans and being a nuisance, there are few animals that can outdo raccoons.

They can get trapped in our homes, they make a mess of the trash, and in the worst-case scenario, they could cause injury to people or pets.

All About Raccoons

Before we humans came bursting onto the scene, raccoons lived in the forest and along waterways foraging and finding food wherever they could. Now that we have developed our cities and neighborhoods in their original habitat, the raccoons no longer have quite as much natural space.

This has led to a situation where they live alongside humans; but for the most part, these clever little creatures have done an impressive job of adapting to our presence.

Raccoons primarily go out to find food during the night. This is the prime time for these animals because they have good vision and their coat provides them with cover in the dark.

Just like humans, raccoons are omnivores and they will essentially eat anything that they can digest. That is part of the reason that they love to go after our trash; any scrap of food that we throw away will make a valuable source of nutrition for a raccoon.

With humans moving into what was once their territory and the fact that many of us provide a good source of food for raccoons, it is no wonder that they want to live in our neighborhoods. This is why problems between us are so common.

Rise in Raccoons

Raccoons and humans residing in the same area is nothing new, but around the state of Louisiana, the number of raccoons in populated areas has been on the rise.

It doesn’t matter if you live in some of the more rural parts of the state or if you live in a bustling city like New Orleans or Baton Rouge – raccoons are there and they consider it their home too.

The reason for this uptick in pest populations is somewhat complex. As mentioned above, our garbage often makes a good source of food, and they find parts of our homes to be particularly good places to set up a nest.

However, the greater production of their natural food sources have also been on the rise and the rising of waterways have also pushed more of them into places where humans live.

Special Concerns about Raccoons and their Young

One of the trickiest problems that can occur with raccoons living around humans is when a mother raccoon decides to make a nest in a home. Trying to evict a mother raccoon that has young babies can be difficult and it almost always leads to the separation and imminent death of the young.

Most often, it is best to just wait for the young raccoons to reach an age where they can leave on their own; if waiting is not an option, then you will need to consult with a professional.

Prevent Raccoon Tenants

If you have had problems with raccoons in the past, then you should consider taking some measures to prevent new raccoons from coming to fill the spot left by the ones that were there.

If you currently have a raccoon living in your house, then you should definitely call a professional pest control service to remove it; our team will also let you know some of the best methods for preventing a reoccurrence.

If you are looking for a way to keep them out of your home on your own, then here are a few steps that may help. First, you are going to need to inspect the area where you think they live.

Make sure that there are no animals currently in the area and look for different ways that the raccoon may be gaining entry. Once you have found the possible points of entry, you should employ sturdy materials such as solid wood or metal hardware cloth to exclude the animal in the future.

If you have raccoons in your home, then you definitely want them removed as soon as possible. They can damage your property, make it unsanitary and they can present a threat for disease and injury.

That being said, using a humane approach to removal is the right thing to do. If the animal should expire in your home, at the very least you will be forced to handle it to remove it, and this will expose you and your home to disease.

Of course, it is possible to get the live raccoon out of the house yourself without putting the animal or you at risk, but this is not easily done.

The best solution to raccoon removal and exclusion is to contact a professional. Our wildlife experts will safely remove the animal, then go over the area with you to ensure they don’t return. When you call Dugas, you can be sure your property is protected for the future.