Raccoon Family are the unwanted guests in an Osterville, MA Home

10/7/2015 (Permalink)

This raccoon may look cute but you can't imagine the damage that he can do to your home!

The only thing worse than your teenage son or daughter throwing a party in your home for a hundred of their closest friends might be a family of raccoons squatting in your summer home over the winter. If this scenario sounds highly unlikely, keep on reading because that is exactly what happened to one of our customers.

He had just arrived at his Osterville home, planning to open it for the summer. When he opened the front door and saw the destruction in his home, he was shocked. A house full of frat boys with an unlimited supply of alcohol couldn’t have done more damage than this family of raccoons. Tips for Property Owners

With paws that act as human hands and fingers with the dexterity of a great surgeon, raccoons can get into anything they want—cabinet doors, refrigerators—nothing is out of reach. The vandalism was almost beyond words. They broke into the pantry and cabinets. The animals ripped holes in the wall to get at the insulation. They drank from the toilet and defecated throughout the house. Urine-soaked drywall caused a bedroom ceiling to cave in. The critters' paw prints could be seen on the walls throughout the house and on the central fireplace, providing the evidence of how they broke into the home. The animals even slept in the beds. 

We arrived on the scene ready to begin the cleanup process but soon discovered that the work would have to wait. The vermin were still making their way back into the house and they had to be caught and completely removed from the area before we could start cleaning.

Hint: The best method for removing raccoons is with a trap baited with food.

One of the biggest concerns with this type of damage was the potential health issue. Raccoons are the primary host of Baylisascaris procyonis, a roundworm that can be harmful to people. Roundworm eggs are passed in the feces of infected raccoons, and people become infected when they breathe in the eggs. Anyone who is exposed to environments where raccoons frequent is potentially at risk. Wearing respirators to protect themselves, my team began the arduous process of making that scene of immense destruction, “Like it never even happened.”

Hint: Most insurance companies do not cover the damages caused by vermin getting into the house.

How to clean up after a raccoon has gotten into your home!

• Take care to avoid contaminating hands and clothes.
• Wear disposable gloves.
• Wear rubber boots that can be scrubbed or cover your shoes with disposable booties that can be thrown away, so that you do not bring eggs into your household.
• Wear a N95-rated respirator if working in a confined space to prevent accidental ingestion of eggs or other harmful materials.
• Feces and material contaminated with raccoon feces should be removed and burned, buried, or bagged and placed in the trash to be sent to a landfill.