$quirrel Problem$ are co$ting me $$$$$$

[rmaynard 14,970]

I am looking for a humane solutions to my squirrel problem.

I live on a wooded lot. We have 100's of gray squirrels and chipmunks. On Tuesday, I had my 2003 Astro van towed to the shop because I had a gas leak as soon as I started the engine. The van has been sitting for most of the winter without being driven. Well after getting the vehicle up on the lift, here is what was found.

The squirrels and chipmunks had gnawed through the fuel lines, wiring harness, vacuum hoses, heater hose insulation, brake lines, ABS sensor wires and who know what else.

Just to replace all the fuel lines alone, my bill is up to around $1000.00. Yes that is One Thousand Dollars. That is just the beginning. Looks like this little misadventure is going to cost me well over $3000.00.

I am wondering if anyone has a lasting solution to eliminating the entire squirrel and chipmunk population. Poisoning is out of the question since this is a residential neighborhood with other pets and small children that could be exposed to the poison.

Has anyone tried ultrasonic pain generators?

[chazm 412]

Good luck getting rid of the litte boogers, I haven't tried the ultrasonic zappers, but that does sound like fun

Chas

[massey 111]

Maybe install some cats in the area?

[SCOOBY 312-h 14]

peanut butter laced with rat poison. i am a very humane person, but when nature fights i fight back, if ya cant shoot em or pay to have them removed then try it. this is how my paps neighbor got rid of his. and i think that was for the chippys, the squirrels im not sure of how to rid of other than small game hunting. hope this helps a little_____Corey

oh yeah you could find someone who will trap them for ya and take them somewhere else. that would be the "humane" thing lol.

[baerpath 517]

How about a small terrior, I know my Newf loves chasing squirrils. Surprises the squirrils how high he can get He's got 3 this winter

I alway put moth balls under stuff to keep little stuff away when parking it for awhile

[SousaKerry 500]

Get a good dog...

[sscotsman 141]

Poison is useless..you cant defeat the critters themselves, the only thing you can do is prevent their access to things

you dont want them to mess with..

I found this on a gardenweb forum years ago and copied it to send to my aunt, who was having squirrel issues,

to me, this guy (or gal) makes some logical points:

Dear Neighbor,

I heard that you are having a squirrel problem, been there myself!

There are several things you can do to minimize squirrel damage, and there is one thing that will absolutely not work,

and can potentially cause far more problems than it will ever solve: poison.

There is no specific "squirrel poison", most of the time they wont even go for rat poison, and even if they do, you will create other problems:

1. The squirrel wont die instantly when it eats the poison, it will wander around for awhile before it dies. and where will it die?

anywhere..in your attic, in your garage, under your porch, in some inaccessible hole around your property..

what is the result? the putrid stink of a dead animal right where you live..not very pleasant..

and if you hope to kill *lots* of squirrels, you will have *lots* of dead squirrels stinking up your home..

(but you wont kill lots..only a few)

But lets say you did kill lots..would that solve your problem? not in the least..because:

2. Once your immediate area is free of squirrels, what will happen next? new squirrels will very quickly move in from all the yards surrounding yours, making the poisoning a futile exercise. If your yard is a nice habitat for squirrels, (which it obviously is, because you are having squirrel issues) with lots of trees and food, *nothing* will keep them away. New squirrels will rush right in to fill the void, and you will be right back where you started. You are literally surrounded by squirrels, for hundreds of miles in all directions. It is literally impossible to keep them out of your yard.

3. Some poisoned squirrels will die near (or in!) your house, causing a stink..but others might die farther away, which can potentially harm other animals, and people. Dogs, cats, hawks, eagles, will all scavenge on a dead squirrel, which can harm or kill those animals, some of which could be pets. (and dead hawks and eagles *increase* the pestilent rodent supply! if you have a hawk nearby, you want to encourage him, not kill him.) You can't control where the poisoned squirrel will die, it could wander off quite some distance before it dies, well outside of your own yard, so you cant control what happens to its body. Even curious young children might be tempted to pick one up, and thus be exposed to the poison. Not a situation you want to find yourself responsible for.

And the worst part is, you would be spreading poison around your property and neighborhood for no reason, for no gain, because it wont even solve your squirrel problem in the first place..new squirrels will just move right back in.

So what can you do? several things. If you are getting squirrels into an attic or garage, you have to seal them out. You have to discover where they are getting in, and seal up the opening with thick small-mesh wire fence pieces, that they can't chew through. Experiencing damage to items on the deck , porch or yard? like houseplants or other items? you have only two options:

1. fence them in so the squirrels cant reach them, or:

2: Don’t keep those things outside. Nothing else will work. We have to learn how to live with the squirrels, because we will never, ever, kill them all. It has been said that mothballs will keep squirrels away from small regions, like boxes or a shed. That isn’t an ideal situation either, because mothballs are also a poison (be especially sure to keep them away from children) but at least animals wont eat mothballs, or spread them around, so they are "safe" in that respect. The smell will keep squirrels away from small specific areas, where the mothballs are laid out, so that is one realistic solution that could work for some situations.

But please don’t consider poison. Not only could you accidently poison "unintended" animals, pets and people, exposing your (and your neighbors) yards, pets and children to the poision, it's also probably illegal to use a poision in a way it's "not intended" for. And on top of all that, It simply will not work, at all, ever. You can't poison every squirrel in the world, and even if you killed *every* squirrel on your entire property, two weeks later you would have just as many right back again, because new squirrels would love to take over the prime territory vacated by their dead rivals. ('Nature abhors a vacuum' as they say.) They will gladly move into an ideal squirrel habitat such as your yard. You could *reduce* the population by cutting down every single tree in your yard! but that's not a realistic solution for most people, and besides, it would still only reduce the population, not eliminate it completely, because all your neighbors would still have trees. Your tree-less yard would simply be a small open "park", and squirrels would still enjoy that just fine. The only way to win the battle is to fence them out, physically, (the best option) or perhaps repel them from small areas with things that "stink"..but nothing else will work. In the grand scheme of scheme of things, we will never win the war against squirrels, we can only win the small battles.

[rmaynard 14,970]

Who ever wrote that and thought that fencing them out would work has forgotten that squirrels climb, jump, defy gravity, and sometimes even appear to be able to fly. There's not a fence made that can keep a squirrel out of any area. Chipmunks dig, burrow, and tunnel their way to what they want.

I'm thinking that since I don't have a dog, and don't want one, and since dogs and cats are not allowed to roam free in my neighborhood, my only choice at this point is to try ultrasonic pain generators, and large rat traps for the deaf ones.

Edited February 15, 2013 by rmaynard

[KC9KAS 4,741]

Who ever wrote that and thought that fencing them out would work has forgotten that squirrels climb, jump, defy gravity, and sometimes even appear to be able to fly. There's not a fence made that can keep a squirrel out of any area. Chipmunks dig, burrow, and tunnel their way to what they want.

ELECTRIC FENCE.............

[Trouty56 565]

Bob....possibly feed the squirrels at the boundary to your property. I have had good luck at funneling cat litter (used) in the burrows of chipmunks. I've heard fox urine is good also. I'm not sure if it is the smell of a predator or the stink itself. But I was once invaded bu chipmunks and now....gone!!

[groundhog47 347]

Small to medium live trap with some bone, pecans, walnuts or something they can gnaw or eat. Got three with pork chop bones. Then you can do a far release, give to someone for muligan or fried squirrel. I caught one , let it out about 3 hours later, it got about 6 feet and feel over dead. They go absolutley nuts inside that cage. It may be the previous cat smell. Oh, yes tried that TSC small repellent, doesn't seem to affect any critter>

Edited February 15, 2013 by groundhog47

[rmaynard 14,970]

I still have half a jug of Critter Repellant in the garage. Seems they like the stuff.

Trapping and transporting would be a full time job. You see, I don't have just a few squirrels, I have literally hundreds of them.

My neighbor puts squirrel feed in the back of his house to try to lure them away from his stuff, but it only seems to encourage more squirrels to come into the area.

[Trouty56 565]

Start cutting trees.....????? Nice pellet gun and fill the freezer and the neighbors......have a squirrel fry at your tent at the show....

Edited February 15, 2013 by Trouty56

[posifour11 723]

Rat traps with peanut butter. Bird feeder and accurate pellet gun. Ninja cats. ;)

[AMC RULES 36,962]

A big bore pellet gun might do the trick...in the name of saving a , about as humane as it gets.

Edited February 15, 2013 by Gimpyonagoodday

[buckrancher 2,678]

[AMC RULES 36,962]

Yeah...a .50 cal squirrel launcher...even better.

Wonder if we could build one big enough for the deere in the back yard?

[KATO 115]

Maybe try feeding them !! I feed sunflower seeds to small animals and the only trouble i had was with

chipmunks digging in the garden. That stopped when i let one who had moved in, stay . because it became

his territory he chased the others away. Never had trouble with ATV's or tractors or old truck parked in back.

Sunflower seeds are alot cheaper than $3000 .00

[rmaynard 14,970]

I don't think that is the solution. The neighbor feeds them peanuts. Then, I find a pile of peanut shells sitting on the engine where they ate the peanuts for dinner, and my wiring for dessert.

[Ken B 3,116]

That really stinks Bob. Other than a dog (not all dogs are capable anyway) I don't know of any solutions. I have a Beagle that hunts and kills em in an instant, she is lethal. No squirrels in my yard anymore. My neighbor shoots them with a BB gun, he still has a problem with them, I don't. When I first moved into my house I built at least a dozen squirrel house's and put them high up in the trees away from my house. That did keep them away. I wouldn't feed em. Ya might wanna drive that Astro a little more often.

[posifour11 723]

Remembered something. My dad sprays hot sauce/ cayenne pepper mixture under his hood to keep packrats from chewing on wires, etc.

[rmaynard 14,970]

The Astro is not the only issue. I can't bring the horses out any more that I don't have to keep a constant eye on them. Turn my back and there is a nasty varmint sitting on the hood getting ready to take a bite out of the steering wheel or hood latch. I made the mistake of leaving the B-100 worker, and the Charger 10 outside, uncovered while I went away for a couple of days. When I came back here is what I found.

The hood latch on the B-100

Dash housing gnawled

Steering wheel spokes on Charger 10

[roscoemi 245]

Ever consider napalm or agent orange? My buddy's property was over run with starlings. As they are considered a pest they can be eliminated all year, so 3 of us spent some Saturday evenings at sundown with shotguns and cases of shells and made "home" not so friendly and away they went. With the squirrels cut off the food supply as much as possible, kick the neighbor who's feeding them in the pants, and get a beagle or two for awhile. A couple friends with pellet guns would help too.

[Kelly 1,028]

I know you said no outside animals, but we have a cat, well a few that just showed up, we feed them so they stay close to our yard, and this winter no mice in the house or garage, and last fall our chipmunks were all but gone, just tell the neighbors you don't know who's cats they are, you just felt sorry and started feeding them.

[sscotsman 141]

Who ever wrote that and thought that fencing them out would work has forgotten that squirrels climb, jump, defy gravity, and sometimes even appear to be able to fly. There's not a fence made that can keep a squirrel out of any area. Chipmunks dig, burrow, and tunnel their way to what they want.

I'm thinking that since I don't have a dog, and don't want one, and since dogs and cats are not allowed to roam free in my neighborhood, my only choice at this point is to try ultrasonic pain generators, and large rat traps for the deaf ones.

Well, I dont think they were talking about a "normal" fence that is open in the top..

because yeah, it obvious a squirrel can climb any fence..

when they said:

1. fence them in so the squirrels cant reach them,

I pictured it as a houseplant *completely* fenced in!

sides and top..

but perhaps they could have worded that better..

Scot