Raccoons and you

As we get into the raccoon breeding season, they become extremely active. Every year, we get flooded with calls about raccoons, typically females looking to give birth or already having had kits in your home or on your property. This is a good time to discuss some of the things that you might expect to come across if this becomes an issue for you.

Raccoons breed in the beginning of the year, sometime between January and March. After their gestation period, females typically give birth between April and May. Females will typically give birth alone. That is the most common instance we come across.

Often times young siblings who are one year old will travel around together in small family units, and adult males are more often solitary. When we get calls for loud noises in attics or chimneys, these are some of the questions we ask to understand the situation.

When a female raccoon gives birth, she must stay away from adult male raccoons. If an adult male raccoon comes across a female with young, his instinct will kick in and he will kill the female’s kits and attempt to mate with her. It is a cruel part of nature, but that’s how they operate. In spring during the birthing season, the most common raccoon occurrence is a female with young.

Young raccoon looking down inside structure

When raccoons utilize a structure, typically they either enter the attic (through a number of vulnerable roof points) or the chimney.

Raccoons are excellent climbers, and typically live up in tree cavities. They are large enough where they can walk up and down chimney flu’s with ease while other animals cannot, making them great places for giving birth. Chimneys typically lead to either a fireplace or a furnace.

The raccoons realize that there is often a large flat space above a fireplace, and this is their preferred birthing location. Some of the clues that raccoons may be living in your chimney include noises going up and down, smells coming from that area in the house, and vocalizations. Adult female and young kits are very vocal, and they make chirping and squeaking noises very often.

Any of these signs tells you that it may be time to evict them. There are very safe and humane ways of evicting mother raccoons with their kits, and after the eviction process it is recommended that you seal the area up with a proper chimney cap or material to seal the entry point.

3 young raccoons removed from chimney structure with adult.