Bat Extermination

10.23.2007 - Today I went to a commercial building, a large department store, with thousands of healthy bats flying in and out. Months earlier, the store had hired their normal pest control company to take care of the bat problem, and they sprayed the bats and the area with bug poison. I found about ten bat carcasses outside. Some of the old/frail had died. The vast majority lived, and the problem persisted, and so they decided to hire me to take care of the bats correctly.

Let me get it right out to anyone who found this post in a search for a method of bat extermination - AN ATTEMPT TO DO SO IS IMMORAL, ILLEGAL, AND IT WILL NOT WORK. If you don't care about the first point, that's just your opinion. But I hope these last two points will convince you to remove the bats properly.

It's a nice coincidence that the only effective way to remove bats from a building, and I'm not just saying this - bat physiology and behavior dictates it - involves not harming them at all. For example, take rats. I usually have to kill some rats in order to remove them (not with poison, with traps). But with bats, the whole group is 100% removed, permanently, with guarantee, and none of these valuable animals are harmed. I don't expect people to change their thinking - a lot of people view bats as disgusting vermin, to be classified with cockroaches. This is terribly untrue, for bats are wonderful creatures. Many species, including this one, can live lives up to 15 years in the wild, and consume millions of insects. They are a marvel of nature and yada yada - just please don't try to kill them if you don't want them in your house or building. Don't hire an ignorant pest control company whose only tool is a spray pump of poison. Hire someone who knows bats, and preferably, who has the BCI (Bat Conservation International) Bats In Buildings certification. This doesn't mean you're getting some bat worshipping tree-hugger. It means you'll get someone who will do the job correctly and legally.

I admit that when I remove bats from a building, it's not what's best for them. If I wanted what was truly best for the bats, I'd find a way to let them stay in the building. But I understand that a place like this department store, or a persons home even, can't have the accumulation of guano, the smell, the occasional bat flying inside the building, etc. I remove all of the bats properly, and even though they are displaced, they live to find a new home. One final thing about killing bats - do you really want a bunch of bat carcasses in your building, causing a terrible odor, or dead bats lying around, like in the above photo? No? Ah, I'm so relieved. I think I'll celebrate with a nice lunch of grilled bat sandwiches.

Do it yourself: Visit my How To Get Rid of Bats page for tips and advice.
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When it comes to bats, they have their good points and their bad points. Having them flying around your location, in general, is not so bad because they keep insect populations down, including mosquitoes. They only come out at dusk and they fly around all night eating up every single insect they can find until dawn starts to show up and then they go back to their home to sleep. There are also some bad points to having a bat issue in your home. They are messy, dirty, and unhealthy. Your home is your escape from the rest of the world, you don’t need the likes of these creatures making themselves at home inside your attic, raising their family, and then pooping all over the place while hiding out during the day. When you notice that there are bats in your home, you need to take matters to a professional for bat extermination.

What do Bat Removal Professionals do?

Bat removal experts will first come to your home and inspect it. They will check the interior of your home as well as the exterior of the home or building so they can see where the bats are getting in through.

They will then survey the building or home, count all the entrances around the area and count the number of bats that may be nesting there.

The professional will then give you an estimation of what is needed to remove them, how much time it will take, and the cost of the services so you will know upfront.

They will then give you a final report on what was done and how you can prevent this situation from occurring again in the future.

It’s not something they can do all of a sudden. They cannot come out and set a trap or place pieces of poisoned bait around within the walls to kill them. Bats are protected during certain times in some states so during the summer months, when mothers have babies that can’t fly around just yet and depend on mom for nutrition, you cannot do anything that may cause the babies to be trapped inside and slowly die of starvation. Your professional will know the laws for your state and will let you know when the work can be done.

Once the professional is able to remove the bats, they will most likely choose the netting method because It basically relocates the bats on their own. They go out of their exit and fly away but when they return, they cannot figure out how to get back in. They will then give up and move on to another place to call home. The professional will need to keep the netting in place for a while to avoid them coming back prematurely.

Once the bats are removed from the home, you will want to schedule a regular seasonal bat inspection in order to make sure that they do not come back and if they do, they are not there long before they are removed by the professional.