Wildlife-removal company THAT IS DEFINITELY NO-KILL

[WSB]

We have had noises in the attic of our small old house for a very long time and even with all the dire warnings about wire-chewing and all that, I have not been particularly disturbed … we consider our little lot wildlife habitat. However, now there is clearly something LARGE up there. We nicknamed it Cloverfield. Co-publisher does NOT want Cloverfield to stay very long and called somebody found off Google. That somebody says, probably a pregnant raccoon getting ready to have babies up there. I am reluctantly seeing the potential wisdom of arranging to have mom evicted … but want to be VERY sure we wouldn’t be hiring someone who is going to drive away with raccoon and/or future babies in cages, claiming he’ll release them, but then doing God-knows-what. If I had the equipment, I’d drive them up to Snoqualmie (or something) myself. I don’t, so I have to trust that’s what’s going to happen here. Any recommendations? I don’t care if they live in the yard. I don’t care if they live right outside the back door. I would build them their own mini-condo if I had carpentry skills. But somehow we have to get them out of the attic and seal up whatever they’re using to get in there, first — TR (still not really sure she wants to do this)

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[Robindianne]

I looked on Angie’s list but could only find “bug killer” types. My ex used to catch moles in big white paint buckets (not sure how but I could ask) and release them in an orchard several miles away. Now, don’t get me started on the ethics because I’m certain the orchard owners didn’t give permission. But if you know somewhere to release, I can ask if he knows about catching racoons humanely. I think he used worms and bugs for the moles but not sure at all how he rigged this all up. Or maybe someone else here has an idea for catch and release?

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[WSB]

Thank you for kindly checking it out for us. We did search extensively. At the moment, the critter doesn’t seem to have come back in the past 24 hours or so – we tried a different tactic yesterday, making the attic an unpleasant place by blasting an air horn from both ends. Unfortunately, that required someone to go up on our steeply pitched roof so we’re not going to try that again … perhaps the need won’t arise. — TR

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[MargL]

The WA Dept. of Fish and Wildlife has a pretty extensive page about ‘Living with Wildlife’

http://wdfw.wa.gov/wlm/living/raccoons.htm

You might try contacting the regional office

http://www.wdfw.wa.gov/reg/region4.htm

As far as I can tell, if it is a raccoon it’s illegal to trap it without a permit and it’s illegal to release it outside of it’s ‘home area’, which would basically be your yard or neighborhood. And if it really is a mommy raccoon there’s all sorts of other rules and regulations about looking for the babies, etc.

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[WSB]

Oh, I’m all over “living with wildlife” … which is why even the concept of maybe having to find a way to evict anything from our attic disturbs me. Frankly, I’d just as soon yield our house and yard to whichever critters want to live here, given they have so few places left to go … and we have deliberately grown all the trees and shrubbery around the house in order to create more habitat. It’s now been 2 nights since I’ve heard anything so I’m hopeful the “crisis” has been averted. Thanks!!!!!! – TR

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