A sound that seemed to come from inside my floorboards drove me outside to see where the source of the scratching (the culprit!) might be.
Over the last two years I have had problems with squirrels getting inside my house.
1) During one winter the house had shifted so much on its pilings that the underside of my house had dropped onto the board onto which the lightning rod wire is stapled, causing it to punch through the plywood on the bottom of my house. The house rising again, perhaps in combination with the board sinking, too, had created a hole right next to a metal foundational beam — a perfect walkway for a squirrel, which ducked inside and began making itself at home.
I heard it scrabbling around underneath my kitchen floor, found the hole, borrowed a live trap from a coworker, trapped the sciurine beast, and relocated it to a park eight miles away — but not before I had boarded up the hole. I had an imaginative vision of the squirrel somehow making it back to my house before I could pull up in my driveway. Although I doubt a squirrel could run faster than the speed limit, I heard later from a friend that I might not have taken it out of its habitat range after all.
2) The next year, during the spring, I heard the same type of scrabble-scratching outside my bedroom window. Since the room is on the second floor, there was only one place for the rodent to be: inside the overhang porch roof. The edge of the wire blocking the ventilated soffit had been pushed in on the end over the steps, creating a hole just big enough for a narrow-skulled rodent to squeeze through.
I set up a table and chair on the porch deck and sat down for a relaxing read, with the ulterior motive of catching the critter in the act. A couple of quiet days later, I did. I heard the pitter-patter of tiny hard nails moving from one end of the soffit to the other. Stealthily I stood and the gnawing mammal froze when it saw me looking up at it.
We stared at each other, I with narrowed eyes, it with wide black ones. Four toes curled around the wood panel forming the soffit vent. It looked down through the gap above, safe.
“You’d better find someplace else to live,” I whispered menacingly. “I’m going to get you.”
Its tail twitched.
I shot it a dagger glance then retreated inside. Whether the varmint stayed in the roof for a while or climbed headfirst down the supporting post, I do not know. I knew my game plan.
I had purchased a live trap and now set it up on the railing, using sunflower seeds as bait. The next days the seeds were gone, but the trap unsprung.
I used peanut butter to glue more sunflower seeds to the trip plate.
The next day, I heard metal rubbing on wood and went outside just in time to stop the trap from plummeting off the edge of the rail from the movement of the squirrel’s urgent attempt to escape. I checked that the end flaps were secured and looked purse-lipped at the rodent again.
“Gotcha.” I bared my teeth in a smile. “I told you I would.”
The squirrel raced back and forth inside the trap, the trip plate clattering at its each pass.
I set the trap in the back of my truck, snuggly between the closed tailgate and campsite firewood, and the squirrel ceased trying to escape. Even though I did not want it to destroy my house from inside out, I also did not want to cause it undue stress whilst in captivity.
Before driving it to a park (across town this time), I climbed a ladder to block the squirrel-sized gap. The majority of the scrabbling sound had come from the other end of soffit, so I made sure to staple-gun a thicker wire mesh over both ends.
3) This third time I found a potential hole near where the old waterline had entered the house. Even though it looked to have no access to the house itself, still I baited the trap with peanut butter-smeared crackers (chunky peanut butter, of course), and drove to work.
When I returned home, the strangest thing—! The trap was gone! Vanished!
A lump hunkered at the base of my throat. What creature could have stolen it? A squirrel would not have been strong enough. What creature had been brave enough to be so close to my house? Had a squirrel been trapped inside so a predator had carried it off in its quest to break through the cage to the juicy center?
Had a fox gotten stuck in or injured by the trap? Needing to know, I began a systematic search for evidence of what had happened.
I discovered one metal end flap several yards away. Upside down, several feet down a game trail that led away from the house I found the trap itself. It was not broken, and, thankfully, sported no blood or fur. I guess that the animal had been able to shake off the trap with no injury to itself. I could breathe deeply now.
I put the live trap away, blocked the hole and have not again heard the telltale sound of a squirrel in my house. Would I have wanted to set out the trap again?
I hope if it was a fox that had reached its snout or paw inside the trap to lick up the nut protein and gobble up the crackers that the metal had really not scratched it or injured it in anyway. I truly hope that I have not scared away any vixen or reynard. I love seeing wildlife of all kinds passing through or running about in my yard.
As long as they don’t try to gnaw on my house.