wildlife control in Colorado: Humane Removal & Prevention

What to look for

Fascia boards gap at the corners, soffit panels drop, deck skirting boards split, and hail and sun age the roof edge. A squirrel needs only a dried-out gap to start chewing, and a skunk needs only a loose skirt board to get under the deck. The rabies picture is the Western one. The CDC notes that skunk rabies dominates the Midwest and West while raccoon rabies belongs to the East, and that more than 20% of skunks that expose a person or pet test rabid. Bats are the other concern at about 35% of rabid animals nationally. Median home values around $530,000 across the state's cities put real money behind the wiring and insulation these animals chew. Colorado wildlife problems run on cold and dryness. The cold sets the calendar: when nights head toward the state's 18F median low, squirrels move into attics and wall cavities, raccoons take attics and chimneys, and skunks settle into the space under decks, porches and open crawlspaces where the ground stays a few degrees warmer. Those animals stay until spring, and by March the dens hold litters. The dryness makes the entries. With humidity near 50% and about 16 inches of rain a year, Colorado wood does not rot the way it does in the humid South; it shrinks, checks and pulls away from its fasteners.

• 1Scratching or a rolling sound in a wall or ceiling that began with the first hard frost.
• 2A chewed hole at a fascia corner where the dry wood has gapped away from the roof edge.
• 3Skunk odor around a deck, a porch or a crawlspace vent, strongest on still nights and peaking in late winter.
• 4A gap in deck skirting with a worn path leading under it, sometimes with a single set of tracks in the snow.
• 5Brown staining and small dry droppings on siding below an eave gap or behind a shutter, the bat entry mark from summer.
• 6Insulation pulled into a ball in one attic corner, or a pile of droppings there.
• 7Heavy footsteps overhead after dark, with a chirring sound in March or April that means raccoon kits.
• 8Gnawed wire insulation in the attic, which squirrels do more than any other animal here.

Treatment options and typical costs

Prices are typical published ranges. Ask what’s included before you compare quotes.

A month-by-month wildlife timeline for Colorado homes.

June through August: 88F days, bat colonies growing in soffits and behind shutters, and most maternity windows fall here, so a bat job found in July usually waits. March through May: litters arrive in the dens, one-way doors become unusable for a few weeks, and the ground thaws enough for deck barriers and crawlspace mesh. Removal from a ladder is possible; ground work is not. January and February: squirrels and raccoons are settled in attics against the 18F nights, skunks are under decks, and skunk odor peaks with late-winter mating. Colorado's wildlife calendar is a cold-climate one with a dry-air twist, and knowing it tells you when to act and when the ground will let a provider work. A homeowner who refastens the roofline in August and buries deck mesh in September catches most problems before they become winter tenants. October through December: the fall rush, as squirrels chew into gapped fascia, raccoons take chimneys, and skunks slip under deck skirting from Fort Collins to Colorado Springs. September: the last comfortable window before the move-in, and the start of bat exclusion season. This is also the best stretch for refastening the fascia and soffit joints the dry air has opened.

wildlife activity by season.

In Colorado, checking the foundation, gaps around doors and windows, and any moisture or clutter near the structure usually turns up the conditions that are letting them in. The most useful first step in Colorado is to note where you have seen wildlife and when they appear, because that timeline is what lets a provider focus on the right area instead of treating the whole property. Scheduling before the busy stretch, rather than after it, tends to mean faster service and a more accurate quote, and a local provider can point out the conditions that matter most in Colorado.

Why dry Colorado air, not rot, opens the house to wildlife.

Walk the house and look at the fascia corners, the soffit panels, the deck skirting boards and the trim around gable vents. Instead it shrinks, checks along the grain, and pulls away from its nails and screws. The state's cities see about 16 inches of rain a year and humidity near 50%, so wood does not stay wet long enough to rot. In Colorado they are made by dryness, and the difference changes what a provider repairs and how the quote is built. In the humid South, wildlife entries are made by rot. When a provider inspects a Denver or Lakewood home, the report should walk the full roofline and skirting and list each joint being closed, and you should compare that count between two bids rather than the total. The repair is refastening, flashing and screening rather than replacing lumber, which is cheaper per opening, but there are usually more openings because the whole perimeter has been working. A squirrel starts chewing at a gap that is already open; a bat slips behind a fascia board that has bowed away a quarter inch; a skunk pushes through a split skirt board. In a dry climate those joints open a little every summer and never close, and hail and high-altitude sun age the roof edge faster than the calendar suggests.

Colorado is skunk rabies country: what that means under your deck.

USDA's raccoon bait zone runs from Maine to Alabama, far from Colorado, so raccoons here are handled more simply than in the East, but skunks and bats carry the rabies weight. The CDC reports around 4,000 rabid animals a year nationally, notes that skunk rabies dominates the Midwest and West, and finds that more than 20% of skunks that expose a person or pet test rabid. In Colorado and the rest of the West it is the skunk, and that decides how the animal under your deck in Aurora is handled. East of the Appalachians the raccoon is the rabies animal. Front Range decks are the state's main skunk den, and a provider who plans to bury mesh at the skirting after the skunk is out is solving the problem; one who only sets a trap is renting you a few weeks. The practical advice: do not approach a skunk that is out in daylight or acting oddly, keep pets away from the deck until the provider has been out, and ask before any trap is set what will happen to the animal and whether a report is filed. When a licensed Colorado operator traps a skunk, the question of where it goes has an answer set by the state and not by the homeowner, and that answer is not the foothills.

What a winter removal visit looks like in Colorado.

The provider then mounts a one-way door on the active entry or sets a trap, and refastens and screens the other roofline gaps, which can be done in cold weather on most Front Range days. Up in the attic, the operator is reading two things at once: which animal left the droppings and nest material, and whether the insulation has been tunneled into runs. The visit starts outside with a ladder, reading tracks in the snow at the deck skirting and frost patterns at the eaves; a warm gap breathes, and the melt around it gives away the entry. A December wildlife call in Fort Collins or Colorado Springs does not look like a July one, and a good provider will tell you up front what can be done at 18F and what waits for thaw. A single number for a single visit is a trap, not a fix, and on a dry-wood house the next squirrel is in by the following October. The report should split the job into a winter phase and a spring phase with a price for each, and it should state how often traps will be checked, since in cold weather that is a welfare question as well as a licensing one. What waits is ground work: burying mesh at the deck, mortar at a crawlspace edge, and blowing in new insulation, all easier and cheaper after the thaw.

Renters, landlords and HOAs: who pays in Colorado.

First, the cold calendar: a squirrel reported in November and ignored until March has become a squirrel with a litter, and the job has grown from a one-way door to a hand removal with more visits. Colorado adds two wrinkles. Put the complaint in an email with a date, and note whether the noise is at dusk or dawn, since that tells the provider the species and tells the landlord how long it has been going on. In most Colorado rentals the owner pays for wildlife removal and the repair behind it, because a gapped fascia board, an unscreened vent or a split deck skirt is a building condition rather than something a tenant caused. Median home values near $530,000 make the wiring and insulation worth protecting on a schedule. If a tenant reports a bat loose in a bedroom, the landlord's first call is the county health line, not the roofer, because the CDC counts about 1.4 million exposure evaluations a year and a tenant's shots are not something a lease clause can wave away. Second, HOAs in the Front Range suburbs around Denver and Aurora often own shared decks, fences and common landscaping where skunks den, and the association may be the party to hire the provider; keep the inspection report so the cost can be assigned. A single roofline and deck inspection across several units in August, when refastening is easy and the ground is soft, is cheaper than winter emergency calls one at a time.

How to compare two wildlife quotes for a Colorado home.

How often will traps be checked, and what happens to a skunk or a bat under Western rabies handling? How many linear feet of deck skirting get buried mesh, and is that in the winter phase or the spring phase? Ask each provider: how many roofline joints does the price refasten and screen, and are they listed by location? Compare them on the pieces. Two Colorado quotes can differ widely and both be honest, because one prices a winter trap and the other prices a winter removal plus a spring barrier. Front Range travel is real, so ask whether it is built in or billed per trip. Take the cheaper bid back to its provider and ask what was left out; in Colorado the answer is usually the deck barrier and the secondary joints, and adding them back closes most of the gap. A bid that covers the full perimeter, splits the seasons, states the check interval and disposition, and puts the follow-up in writing is usually the better value even at a higher number. What license does the operator hold for nuisance wildlife work in Colorado, and what is the written follow-up if the noise returns in 30 or 60 days? If new insulation is on the bid, how many square feet, and can you see the attic photos that justify it before you say yes?

Simple ways to keep wildlife away

• Refasten and screen fascia and soffit joints each August, before the first frost, since dry air keeps opening them.
• Use quarter-inch galvanized hardware cloth on every gable, soffit and crawlspace vent.
• Bury mesh a foot down along deck and porch skirting, bent outward, before the ground freezes.
• Cap the chimney with a stainless cap; open flues collect raccoons and bats during long heating seasons.
• Keep cottonwood, ash and spruce limbs eight to ten feet off the roof so squirrels lose their bridge.
• Store bird seed and pet food in metal cans in the garage; a heated garage is a beacon at 18F.
• Check behind shutters and under ridge caps in June for bat staining, before the summer colony grows.
• Walk the roofline after the first hard frost and again in April, looking for new gaps at the joints.

Questions people ask

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