If you are trying to get rid of bats that have begun roosting in your attic, you might also consider some of the techniques, as applicable, on the page about How to Get Rid of Bats in Your House.
However, if you have bats in your attic, or in buildings where people are not necessarily living, you might consider or try some of the techniques in the following articles. These articles might include techniques for getting rid of bats which you may not care to use if a bat were in the LIVING areas of your house or home. However, these techniques generally follow the same themes as getting rid of bats from your house, which would be:
1 – check to make sure that you actually DO have bats (and not other creatures) in your attic
2 – inspect inside and outside for cracks, crevices, knotholes, and other means of access in and out of your attic
3 – create an environment that the bats will not find to be favorable, and will willingly move out of your attic
4 – seal up very completely the cracks, crevices, knot holes, open spaces, etc, so that bats have no access at all to the inside of your attic
5 – clean up, or have cleaned up, any messes that your bats have made, including feces and urine, the breeding grounds for bacteria and viruses
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Get Rid of Bats with Pop Cans, Balloons, Strips of Aluminum, Etc.
In trying to get rid of bats, you might try hanging strings of empty pop cans, plastic bottles, balloons, mylar balloons, strips of aluminum foil, etc, together in the bats’ roosting spaces. You’ll want to hang these objects in such a way as to allow them to move with a breeze or light wind.
The object of this technique is to make the bats’ resting and roosting spaces less than comfortable or accommodating for the bats, causing them to simply choose other living areas, and to move out of your building. Especially the movements and “clinking together” sounds of these objects might disrupt the bats enough to get rid of your bats.
If your bats‘ roosting spaces are relatively small, more like a small crawl space in an attic, rather than a large space, like a large storage shed or a barn, this intervention might be worth trying. It is certainly a simple, and “low-tech” possible technique to get rid of bats. The cans, bottles, balloons, strips of foil, etc, will have to be hung close enough together to prevent the bats from easily flying around in the space.
If the space where your bats have taken up residence is large, like a barn, this technique will likely not be at all effective, because bats are very accomplished flyers and navigators, well able to fly in and around multiple obstacles, as long as they have enough room to maneuver.
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Get Rid of Bats with Poisons, Wasp Spray, Aerosol “Bombs,” Bleach, Etc.
It is important to note that in many areas, bats are protected species. As such, these methods to get rid of them may be strictly specified and / or controlled. In these areas, killing or injuring bats may not be your best option.
However, probably out of desperation, or perhaps just imagination, there are reports of people using all sorts of poisons, chemicals, sprays, contaminants, etc, to get rid of bats. These include, various types of poisons, wasp and hornet spray, bleach, aerosol dog and cat repellent, aerosol “bombs,” ammonia, glue traps, mouse traps, rat traps, and more. The reasons for using these materials would include to out and out capture (glue traps) or kill (poisons) the bats, or to at least make their roosting areas so undesirable that the bats choose to leave the building.
There are reports of these poisons and chemical contaminants sometimes helping to get rid of bats. However, there are plenty of reports, as well, where these materials were not at all helpful in getting if bats. And, often just the use of these chemicals in the first place may not be at all desirable.
For example, using poison may very well not be a good method for getting rid of your bats. A bat could ingest enough poison to get sick, but not to die. In this case, the bat might just suffer, and still not move out of your house. Or the sickened, partially poisoned bat may be eaten by another carnivorous predator, like a fox, and inadvertently sicken the fox. If the bat DOES ingest enough poison to die, it will likely first crawl into a very small, inaccessible space in your house, and then die.
If you are unable to immediately find the dead bat, it will decompose, resulting in a terrible smell, and creating the environment for the growth and spread of additional bacteria and viruses. Ultimately the growth and spread of bacteria and viruses is exactly what you are trying to prevent, rather than to inadvertently cause in the process of getting rid of your bats.
Some of the same potential problems as above exist with using other forms of “killing” traps, like mouse traps, rat traps, glue traps, etc. The bats are likely considered to be “protected” in your area, and you will want to avoid dead, decomposing tissue in your building.
Clearly, poisons, chemicals, traps and the like are not the best methods for getting rid of your bats. There are other much more simple, effective, and humane methods available, and are described on this web site.
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Get Rid of Bats by Spraying Them With Water
If you are trying to get rid of bats from the attic of the house in which you or others are living, you certainly may not want to spray water inside your building. However, if you are trying to get rid of bats from a storage shed or garage or barn, perhaps with a concrete or dirt floor, you might want to try spraying the bats with water, during the daytime, when they are roosting.
Be sure and first create an open space for the bats to use to escape from the building. For example, be sure and open doors or windows so that the disrupted bats can fly OUT of your building. But even if the bats do fly out of your building, they may very likely fly back into your building later. Bats are very habitual and territorial, and will reliably return back to their same roosting places night after night.
As such, if you do not want your bats to return to your building, or other bats to take up residence in your building, you must very carefully and completely find and seal up ALL cracks, holes, open spaces, deteriorated wood, etc, so that bats will not be able to get back into your building.
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Get Rid of Bats with Garlic, Cloves, Animal Feces, Etc.
Another technique that some people have at least attempted in their efforts to get rid of their bats, is to put bad smelling foods or substances in the roosting spaces of the bats. Some of these bad smelling foods and substances include garlic, cloves, and even animal feces, including the feces of bat predators.
It is important to remember that bats generally like roosting in areas that humans would consider to be dark, damp, dank, and smelly. Bats can live in perfectly happily in closed off areas, like caves, with pounds, or even many tons of bat guano and urine in them, environments that humans would find to be seriously unpleasant and unhealthy.
The reports from people who use the “bad smells” technique to get rid of their bats are consistently unsuccessful, which is no surprise. Bats are much different than people in the environments that they like to live in, and in what they consider to be “smelly.”
This being the case, there is no reason to bother trying to get rid of your bats by using garlic, cloves, animal feces, or other substances that humans would consider to be “smelly.” These will only make the bat roosting area more unpleasant and unhealthy for humans, and could actually encourage the bats to live there.
This web site discusses and describes several more simple, humanitarian, and most importantly, effective methods to get rid of your bats.
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Get Rid of Bats With Rubber Snakes or Other Imitation Predators
Some people have tried, in their attempts to get rid of bats, placing rubber snakes or other imitation (plastic, rubber, cardboard, porcelain, concrete, etc.) bat predators in the roosting places of their bats. The object of this idea, of course, is to threaten or scare the bats into leaving that particular resting area.
Although a small few of these people report that their rubber snake did actually help to get rid of their bats, these people were also often using multiple interventions at the same time. Thus, it was difficult for them to know for certain that they got rid of their bats specifically because of the imitation bat predator. For the most part, people who have attempted this method report that it had no bearing at all on the roosting behavior of their bats.
As such, using imitation bat predators, such as rubber snakes, is considered to be completely ineffective, and not at all worth bothering with, as a means of getting rid of bats.
There are many more simple and effective methods of getting rid of your bats discussed and described in detail on this web site.
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Get Rid of Bats with Mothballs
Using mothballs to get rid of bats is a technique that is often reported and discussed by people, and is actually reported as sometimes being effective.
This technique involves placing handfuls of mothballs inside several nylon stockings, and hanging the stockings in the bats’ resting and roosting spaces. However, it might not be clear, at least in some cases, as to whether it was the mothballs, the hanging nylon stockings, or a combination of both, that was helpful in getting rid of the bats.
This technique is generally not considered to be worthwhile as a legitimate means of getting rid of bats. There are other much more reliable techniques that no doubt would be more successful. And, be sure to keep in mind that even if you are successful in getting rid of your bats, you’ll have to seal up your building, completely, to prevent your bats from returning to their first choice of a roosting location, or other bats from moving into your building.
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Get Rid of Bats with Sound, Light or Other Electric Devices
Another frequently attempted set of techniques to get rid of bats involves using sound devices, like radios, horns, whistles, etc; light devices, like Christmas lights, blinking or flashing lights, strobe lights, or other electric devices, like electric fans.
These devices can be attached to electric timers, to turn them on at dawn, when the bats would be returning to your house after a night of flying and hunting, and / or during the day, when the bats would be resting and roosting in your building. Or they can be attached to motion-sensing devices which would turn on the electric appliance when the motion of flying bats is detected.
The object of these techniques would be to disrupt or disturb the bats’ resting and roosting places in such a way as to cause the bats to move to another, more peaceful location. The success reports of these methods to get rid of bats is quite varied, from complete success to complete failure. These mixed reports are no doubt related to the very many specific factors that are involved, including the type, amount, intensity, proximity, intrusiveness and reliability of the disturbance that is generated.
If the location where your bats have moved into is small, and these electric appliances can be situated without too much trouble, you might want to give these techniques a try. Also, these could be coupled with other techniques, like hanging strings of cans, plastic bottles, balloons, aluminum foil, in the bats’ roosting places. An electric appliance, like a fan, could cause these hanging items to move, possibly disturbing the bats enough to move out of your building.
If you are able to get rid of your bats with these techniques, be sure to keep in mind that your bats will reliably try to get back into your building. And, other bats may choose to move into your building, as well. To prevent this from happening, be vigilant in sealing up and “batproofing” your building. Also, remember to take care of cleaning up the unsanitary excrement, after you get rid of your bats.
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Get Rid of Bats with Sonic & Ultrasonic Sound Devices
Sonic and Ultrasonic Sound Devices are sometimes used in trying to get rid of bats, again, with vastly varied results. As with trying to get rid of bats using sound, light, and other electric devices, this no doubt has to do with many varying factors. The object with this technique, as with several other techniques, is to make the bat’s environment unpleasant for the bats, causing to simply move out of your building, preferring another, more peaceful and less disruptive location.
Some professional exterminators specialize in the use of using sonic and ultrasonic sound devices to get rid of bats. Or, you can readily buy and install these devices, yourself.
Again, remember whenever you are able to get rid of your bats, by whatever manner, be sure to seal up and “batproof” your building to prevent bats from returning, and attend to cleaning up the unsanitary bat excrement.