Bats
Bat Removal & Exclusion, Blue Mountains & Collingwood
Escarpment country is bat country. One-way exclusion done outside the maternity window — and a protected species that must not be killed.
The Niagara Escarpment runs through the middle of our service area, and its crevices, caves and old barns are natural bat habitat. Add older village housing in Thornbury and Clarksburg, chalets with complex rooflines through the Blue Mountains, and a great deal of century farm building across Clearview, and this is the strongest bat region we work in.
The legal position, which decides the whole job
This is not a normal pest job and it is important to be direct about why. Several of Ontario's bat species — the little brown myotis among them — have suffered catastrophic declines from white-nose syndrome and are protected under Ontario's Endangered Species Act. They are not to be killed, and there is no legitimate extermination approach to a bat colony.
The correct method is exclusion: let the bats leave and prevent their return. Anyone offering to poison or fumigate bats is offering something that is both illegal and useless, because a dead colony in a roof is a decomposition and mite problem on top of the original one.
The maternity window
Timing is the single most important thing on this page. Through roughly early June to late August, a maternity colony contains flightless pups. If you exclude the adults during that window the mothers are locked out and the pups die inside your roof — which is inhumane, contrary to the species protections, and leaves you with carcasses in the insulation.
So exclusion happens either in spring before the pups arrive, or from late summer once the young are flying, and through autumn. If you call us in July with bats in the attic, the honest answer is usually a temporary containment to keep them out of your living space and a booked exclusion for late August. We would rather tell you that than take the job at the wrong time.
How exclusion actually works
| Stage | What happens |
|---|---|
| Survey | Dusk emergence watch to find the actual exit points, not the guessed ones |
| Secondary sealing | Every gap over about 1.5cm closed except the primary exits |
| One-way devices | Fitted to the exits — bats leave, cannot re-enter |
| Settling period | Devices left in place several days to a week |
| Final seal | Devices removed, exits closed permanently |
| Remediation | Guano removal and attic clean-up where the roost was established |
The dusk emergence watch is what separates a job that works from one that does not. Bats use gaps you will not find from a ladder in daylight, and sealing the wrong ones simply moves them along the roofline.
Guano, and why it is not just mess
An established roost leaves accumulated droppings, and disturbing them dry raises dust that can carry Histoplasma spores. It also degrades insulation and, in quantity, loads a ceiling. Remediation is a separate line on the quote from the exclusion, and on a long-established colony it can be the larger of the two.
One thing worth doing yourself: if a bat is in your living space and there is any possibility of contact with a person or a pet — particularly someone asleep, or a child — do not release it. Contain it and contact your local public health unit, because rabies post-exposure decisions depend on being able to test the animal.
Talk to a Collingwood pest control company
Tell us what you have actually seen and where, and roughly when it started. That is usually enough to say whether you are looking at something we should be at this afternoon, something that wants a booking, or something where the honest answer is to wait — bat exclusion in July being the clearest example of the last one.