Squirrels can be amazing animals, but they can become a pest when too many of them live around a house and cause damage to it. Only in the United States, the damages caused to properties can be of thousands of dollars. Knowing this negative aspect about squirrels, it is necessary to do something to stop infestations and one of the most efficient methods is the one that involves the use of squirrel poison.
Of course, it is moral to try all the methods that can help you to get rid of squirrels while they still remain alive and use poison only as a last resort. If you have children or pets in your home, it would be best to use squirrel traps instead, as there is a small chance to poison the children or the pets.
Why use poison against squirrels?
When squirrels become a nuisance, they can destroy your garden, and also chew materials like insulation, walls, and wires. The use of poison has its benefits, but there are also drawbacks. Poison is many times the last solution after different attempts to get rid of squirrels using less painful and lethal ways.
How can poison be used?
You will have to fool squirrels with poisoned food or use the food as bait and trap the animals for killing them. Chemicals in the form of powder can be used, but squirrels may not be fooled by the substance alone.
You will have to mix it with food. One food that squirrels love to eat is bird seed. But, you can basically use any food that is eaten by squirrels, with the condition to mix it well with a small dose of poison so that the animals don’t feel or taste it. Besides seeds, you can use nuts, peanut butter, sweetened nut products, pieces of snickers candy bars, etc.
Is it easy or hard to kill squirrels with poison?
The truth is that killing squirrels with poison is hard unless you are a professional in the field. There is no poison that is one hundred percent effective, so you have to try some of the best chemicals.
One of the worst things about these animals is that they are always moving and their movement is very fast. Using poison is not only hard from a practical point of view, but also from a moral perspective, especially when you find out that the method is quite painful for these small creatures. Just leaving powder in the areas where the animals have been spotted is not too effective.
What is the most effective chemical to use against squirrels?
Some of the substances that people prefer to use against squirrels are rat poison or ethylene glycol. These chemicals can be mixed with bird seeds and other foods that squirrels like. Squirrels rarely touch rat poison, unless it is mixed with food.
Another type of chemical to use is anticoagulants. They work gradually and don’t smell bad. The results are severe anemia and circulatory shock and both of these results lead to death after a few days. A substance that has rapid effects against squirrels is strychnine. It is absorbed fast by the stomach and death can occur in two hours after it is ingested.
Other chemical poisons to use are white phosphorus, crimidine, fluoroacetamide, bromethalin, thallium, barium, and many others. All of these substances will help you get rid of a pest in less than a week or in one week.
Are squirrel poisons legal to use?
Some of them may be, but most of them are not. There are over-the-counter solutions, but these are the ones that can be harmful to children and pets.
If you are not sure whether to use a certain poison or not in your state, the best thing to do is to do some research about any state regulations that may be involved. In the United States, there are hundreds of different regulations covering all aspects of poison usage and baits usage.
Common traps that use poisonous baits
An example of poisonous baits that are used on a massive scale in farming operations is a combination between chlorophacinone and diphacinone. The trap consists of spreading out rolled oats. Once the animals become used to the setting, you can mix poison and grains and place the mixture in the places where grains have already been eaten.
Several types of baits can be used and traps only become useful when effectively baited. These creatures are intelligent and they will not get into a trap if they don’t have a good reason to do it. The best reason could be a reasonable quantity of tasty food.
Will the animals die outside or in your house?
Poisoned squirrels will die in the areas where they lived. This means that, if the animals were living outside, they will die outdoors.
It is, however, more common for squirrel deaths to occur indoors. If the animals lived under your roof, they may crawl inside if they get the chance to do it before they die. The same thing can happen to squirrels that live in your attic.
The place of death also depends on the type of poison that is used. If the animals are too ill to reach their nest, they may be found dead in the middle of your yard. Another case in which you may find the corpses in your yard is when the animals from the attic or roof are desperate to find some type of relief. The illness can force them to go outside in search of water.
Solve your squirrel problem without a headache here.
What to do once you kill the squirrels?
After one or more creatures are dead, the trouble isn’t over. Sometimes the animals will not die at the exact place where they are poisoned and you will have to find their corpses. This will not be very hard, especially if a few hours have already passed since their death.
The smell of the corpses can be so strong that it may occupy every room of the house. People who already experienced this say that the smell can sometimes be so strong that you feel the need to move out of the house for a few days.
The good news is that you can use the smell intensity as guidance for finding the animal’s carcass. You obviously have to get rid of the corpse to make the odor dissipate. Some common hiding spots where the squirrels go to die are inside walls or attics or other dark areas of your house.
Using professionals to get rid of squirrels
No matter what solution you use to poison squirrels, it is always best to ask for the help of professionals in the field of pest control. Choose a company that specializes in squirrel removal—one that is aware of the pros and cons of different squirrel rodenticides and alternatives like trapping.
Because the use of poison for any type of pests can involve hazards and complications, it would be wise for homeowners who want to get rid of a squirrel infestation to call a company that has experience in dealing with such situations. In most cases, it can be better to stop spending your money on poisons and pay a professional to decide the best approach.
Further Squirrel Poison Resources:
- California Ground Squirrels – University of California Integrated Pest Management
- Squirrel Control, Prevention & Removal (Top 7 Tips to Get Rid of Squirrels) – NeverPest
- Hazards to Raptors from Strychnine Poisoned Ground Squirrels – The Raptor Research Foundation
- That Squirrel Poison – Pacific Rural Press, 1908