How to Remove a Raccoon From Under Your House

It can be unnerving to discover a raccoon living under your home. Beyond your annoyance over spilled garbage or damaged gardens, you may be worried about having these masked intruders living so near your children or pets. Raccoons have even been known to enter houses through dog doors at night. There are several ways to remove a raccoon from under a house or porch. They include frightening the raccoon away or trapping and relocating it. Just be sure to protect yourself and any baby raccoons that might be sharing the space under your building.

Things You'll Need

• Battery-operated radio
• Bright outdoor lights
• Rags
• Ammonia
• Newspaper
• Flour
• Hardware cloth
• Flashing
• One or two cages
• Pillowcase
• Marshmallows or white bread
• Heavy gloves

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Instructions

• 1

  Check beneath the house for baby raccoons. If you find any, hold off on removal until they are old enough to follow their mother out of the den.

• 2

  Close all but one entrance to the space under your house using hardware cloth, then encourage the raccoon and its litter to leave by putting a radio, tuned to a talk station, in its den or nearby. You can also put bright lights or rags soaked with ammonia outside the raccoons' living space until they appear to have left.

• 3

  Stuff newspaper lightly into the remaining entrance to the raccoons' den, or put an 8-inch band of flour in front of the opening. If these haven't been disturbed after a couple of days, the raccoons have likely left, and you can seal the opening with hardware cloth or flashing.

• 4

  Ask your state's wildlife department whether it's legal for you to trap and relocate the raccoons if none of the previous methods work. In some states, you can trap raccoons, but must then euthanize them.

• 5

  Buy a cage at least 32 inches long and 12 inches high and wide that will trap a raccoon without harming it.

• 6

  Attract the adult raccoon with a trail of bait that ends deep inside the cage. Rather than baiting with meat--which may draw neighborhood cats into your trap--use white bread or marshmallows until you've trapped your raccoon.

• 7

  Pick up any babies with a gloved hand and put them in a pillowcase or second cage.

• 8

  Drive the raccoon and its babies at least 5 miles from your home and set them free together.