Bat Repellent - What deterrent works?
Bat Repellents - The idea of using a repellent to deal with an animal problem is an attractive one, and simply spraying a substance into the area where the bats are found, or leaving a repellent on the floor below the colony is a very easy thing to do. The key feature of a repellent is that it needs to be very unpleasant for the animals and make it horrible for the bats to remain in that location, and there are relatively few substances that can do this. With options for repellents ranging from commercially available products through to those made using a mixture of ingredients from the home, there are a variety of different repellents that are said to drive bats away from a colony site.
Chemical Bat Repellents
Many of the products that are used as chemical bat repellents are made using naphthalene, which is most commonly known as the main ingredient that is used in producing mothballs. The way these repellents are said to work is that they release a substance in to the air which makes the bats respiratory functions uncomfortable, driving them out into the fresh air to look for another place to call home. Because of the strong ingredients, many of these products will also include an artificial scent so that they do not become too unpleasant to the people who also live nearby. There are also sprays available, but these should be avoided as they can cause the bats to fly unexpectedly, which is not what you would want to happen.
Audio And Light Bat Repellent
There are plenty of different products on the market that are said to drive bats away by using ultrasonic audio pulses or by using lights. Bats naturally like quiet and dark areas as a location for the colony, and what these devices claim to do is to make that colony a less pleasant place for the bats to reside. Audio repellents are said to confuse bats and make it more difficult for the echolocation technique of navigation used by the animals to work properly, while the light makes it more difficult for the bats to rest properly. While these devices can be quite expensive, it certainly doesn't provide any guarantees about removing the bats themselves.
Home Remedies Used As Bat Repellent
Over the years there have been plenty of different substances and blends that have been said to drive away bats from a colony, but in most cases these are not particularly reliable. While using mothballs, which are similar to the commercially available bat repellents is one technique that can be used, there are other tales of people using the strong scent of peppermint oil to drive bats away from a particular location. A more complicated blend is made by combining Sponto 221, mustard oil and sassafras oil to water to create a solution that can then be left near the bat colony to drive the animals away.
Why Bat Repellents Aren't Usually Reliable
There are plenty of reasons why bat repellents are not a guaranteed way of getting rid of bats, but the most important one to consider is that bats will need a significant incentive to leave a location where they have created their colony. In most cases, unless you catch the colony very early before the bats have become settled, repellents will not usually drive these animals away, as the attractions of the locations will outweigh the discomfort caused by any bat repellent. This is why many products will tend to have a mixed result at best, and if you are really wanting a successful way of getting rid of the animals, then physically excluding them from the roof space or cavity will be much more successful in getting rid of the animals.
Alternative Methods Of Getting Rid Of Bats
When it comes to getting rid of bats successfully, then bat exclusion techniques are the best way to solve the problem, and these work by allowing the bats to get out of the cavity where the colony is located, but then preventing them from getting back in. This is usually done by an animal removal expert, who will carry out a survey of the location and identify all of the different locations the bats are using to get in and out of the colony. Once this is done, they will either install an exclusion funnel or netting over these entry and exit points in order to keep the animals out once they leave the colony.
There are many people who will try to use traps to deal with a bat problem, but these are generally ineffective when it comes to dealing with bats. Cage traps can be damaging to the animals as they can injure the animals flying into the walls of the cage, while lethal traps such as snap traps or glue traps will take too long to deal with an entire colony of bats.
Go back to the main Bat Removal page for more information about bat repellent such as bleach, ammonia, mothballs. Can you buy something at Home Depot to repel bat?
