How To Kill Animals in the Attic

I know how to solve the problem, just kill 'em!" It's possible, but killing animals in the attic is actually much more difficult than exclusion or trapping, and less effective. You could set lethal traps by the animal holes, but these traps are very difficult to set, not to mention dangerous. And they only get one animal at a time, so they are ineffecient. What about poison then? There are no registered rodenticides for any animal other than rats or mice, but even those animals should not be controlled with rodenticides. All other animals like raccoons and squirrels never eat food in an attic, so unlike with rats, they will not consume rat poison, and the poison is not designed for most animals, so if they did eat it, they may not die. Also, if you do manage to kill one with poison, the smell of a rotting squirrel is terrible. Any of these attempts are inhumane of course, if you care, which you might not if your top interest is killing them. You might also think that you can simply shoot the animals in your attic. Yes, if the law allows that, you can try. All I can say is good luck, because that would be extremely challenging. I understand if you may hate the vermin in the attic, or think that killing them is the logical approach and so on, but seriously, it's a lot more challenging to kill wildlife than to install a one-way exclusion door or a repeater trap. Most of all, merely killing the animals does not address the root of the problem, and that is the open holes in your house that allow the animals to get inside. If those openings remain, you will never solve a problem with animals in the attic.

How To Kill Animals In The Attic
When you discover that there are animals in your attic, your first instinct is probably to want to get them out as soon as possible and this is common. That being said, there are good and bad methods of getting rid of wildlife with killing being a strongly discouraged method. Despite the number of products you will find that target certain animals, killing any animal in your attic is a bad decision and inhumane. The only exception is in the case of rodents like rats and mice since other methods don’t typically work with them and they reproduce so quickly. If you aren’t dealing with rodents, however, you need to find an alternative to killing.

Why It Is A Bad Idea
One of the most convincing reasons of why you shouldn’t kill animals in the attic is that it is frequently illegal. There are protections in place for many animals along with various killing methods. This is particularly true of bats because they are so highly beneficial to the environment. If you kill an animal and it is illegal to do so in your area, this can result in extremely high fines and plenty of headaches.

Of course, killing an animal is also inhumane and completely unnecessary. The wildlife living in your home have lives of their own and it isn’t fair for you to end that. You also won’t find a humane method of killing the animals so that they do not suffer. Additionally, there are plenty of highly effective alternatives, such as trapping and relocation or exclusion. A wildlife removal expert can easily offer multiple methods of getting the animals out of your attic without killing them. You should also keep in mind that simply killing the animals won’t solve your problem. Unless you seal up your attic, new wildlife will just take their place, leading to an endless cycle.

Poison
If you insist on learning how to kill animals in the attic, you will find many suggestions for poison. Take a closer look and it becomes clear that you will be hard-pressed to find a poison that targets raccoons, squirrels, or the other common wildlife. That is because there isn’t a poison that effectively kills the wildlife in your attic. Most poisons require the animal to eat it, but the wildlife won’t be tempted by it. Assuming the animal does ingest the poison, it may just make them very sick instead of killing them, meaning the animal suffers for days. In the cases when the poison actually works, the wildlife in question has a slow, painful death and leaves you a big problem. You won’t know where the animal goes to die and it will likely be a cozy nook or cranny. You then have to find the carcass before it begins to rot and find a way to safely dispose of it while following local regulations.

Shooting
The idea of shooting a rat or mouse in the attic is incredibly unlikely to succeed unless you are a championship gun user. Even with larger animals that provide a bigger target, like possums or raccoons, you would need to kill the animal in a single shot; otherwise, the animal suffers. If you miss, you will be making holes in your attic and a non-lethal shot may give the animal a slow death from blood loss and once again leave you to find then clean up a mess. Not to mention that shooting an animal tends to create a lot of blood and other messiness to clean.

Trapping Then Killing
Some people think about trapping the animals in their attic to kill them, but this makes no sense. How will you humanely kill the animal once it is trapped? The only way to do this in a truly humane method is with a lethal injection or maybe an elaborate chamber with lethal gas; you need it to be quick and painless. Besides, if you have already gone through the trouble of trapping the animal, you might as well take it outside and release it, giving it a chance at life.

Lethal Traps
A final option for killing animals in the attic is using a lethal trap, such as a body grip trap. You will only find these for certain types of animals and they also lead to slow, painful deaths. There is no reason to use a lethal trap when you could just as easily set up a live cage trap and relocate the animal.

How To Humanely Kill Rodents
As mentioned earlier, the only exception to the rule of not killing animals in your attic is rats and mice. Unfortunately, this is the most effective method of taking care of them, particularly due to their large numbers. Even so, you can work to choose the correct method. Don’t use poison for the same reasons you wouldn’t use it on other animals, it may not work and you have to find the animals. Avoid sticky traps as they catch the rodent and leave it to die of starvation slowly. Instead, opt for a traditional snap trap as this will kill the rodent instantly. Snap traps are also highly affordable and can be reused. A professional can also humanely kill them for you.

How to kill animals in the attic - no matter how much you may hate the critters in your house, it's a heck of a lot easier and more effective to just do a proper animal exclusion. You have the added benefit of not having to deal with dead animal carcasses, or dangerous and difficult lethal traps. The most important thing is this: if you absolutely must kill an animal for some reason, please do something humane like shoot it, rather than attempt to resort to lazy and ineffective poison.