Unwanted Winged Guests

As the season has gotten warmer, more critters have appeared. Because we live in a pretty wooded community, we get more animals than normal. This year has been the year of the bat as they have taken shelter at night on our back porch. As you can imagine, we're not too receptive to our new deadbeat tenets.

We've scoured the internet looking for quick fix ideas on how to most effectively evict, but nothing seems to work. So far, we've tried:

1. mothballs. We put small handfuls in socks and attached them to areas they like to hang out. The smell really bothered us, but the bats seemed not to mind too much
2. pet repellent. We sprayed some stuff typically used to keep dogs out of trash cans and such, but the bats didn't seem to care.
3. ammonia. We sprayed cleaner with lots of ammonia in their favorite spots, but, again, it didn't deter them in the slightest.

So, we're back to square one. We've collected some new ideas that we're going to try next.

1. red pepper with honey.
2. hot sauce.
3. as a last resort, I might try to put up nets and such to inhibit them from sitting on these perches they've found on beams in the porch. I'm really hoping not to have to do this as it may be unsightly.

I'm going to give our new ideas a shot. I'll keep you posted.