Use of one-way doors in wildlife eviction processes
This is a topic I get asked about all the time, whether it be from a potential client asking about the process or a friend who is just curious. Whenever we tackle any job, there are always two main thoughts going through our head:
How will we get the animals out?
How will we seal all the entry points?
How do we get the animal out?
The use of one-way doors are an excellent tool when answering the first question. As with anything, there are optimal times to use them, and there are times when they simply aren’t the best answer. One way doors allow the wildlife inside the area you don’t want them to be in to be able to travel outward, but cannot re-enter. As you can imagine, this is ONLY effective when all other entry points are sealed up at the time it is installed. You cannot install a one way door and eventually get to sealing up the other locations. That animal will immediately try to re enter there, and if not there, somewhere else.
An animal that has made its home somewhere and is dependent on that location, just as if you locked yourself out of your house, will try like hell to get back in. The videos I’ve set here are great examples of exactly what happens after the one way door is used. The skunk is investigating some other options for re entry, while the groundhog (extraordinary burrowers) is going all out trying to get back in. At both of these sites, the animals gave up and moved on after a day or two of trying, and we removed the one way doors after a few more days for final sealing. It is important to understand the burrowing capability of each animal you’re dealing with here, as some animals will commonly dig down a little bit and give up, and others will even back away from the blocked location and try again (which is why we “L” bend back our underground materials to prevent that from happening).
As I mentioned before, one way doors are great in some situations but not so great in others. When you are evicting burrowing species such as groundhogs and skunks, their attempt to get back in is digging until they hit material they cannot pass through. No big deal, you kick the dirt back into place and all is good, they’ll give up after 1-3 days typically and move on to find a new home. We use one way doors for bats as well, and legally this is the only way we can evict them (traps are not effective for bat eviction).
How will we seal all the entry points?
Squirrels are the main species that we do not want to use one way doors for, almost ever. Squirrels are rodents, and chewing is what they do. Many times, that’s how the enter a structure. Their powerful jaws allow them to make short work of any wood standing in their way, especially if there are minor gaps that allow airflow through telling the squirrel there is most certainly a warm hollow space behind that wood. If you imagine those videos above being adult grey squirrels attempting to re-enter a wooden soffit, you would see a whole bunch of wood chunks flying as the squirrel chews and digs.
As I mentioned before, the squirrel(s) believes that space is it’s home and will try anything to get back in. The risk for additional damage is greatly increased when dealing with gray squirrels, which is why we rarely use them when dealing with these situations. This is a conversation I have with many clients, and I will even have them sign off waiving our liability for other damaged sites when using this strategy in areas where I don’t recommend it.
The image below shows a squirrel peering out of a hole it chewed. If we had installed a one way door here, even with the two lower holes closed off, it would likely just move over a foot or two and chew another hole in. There are some cases where they can be used though; i.e a brick or solid block type structure that is in good shape, or a section of a structure that has solid attached metal as the exterior layer. These cases are more few and far between though.
Squirrel peering out from chewed hole in fascia trim.
Of all the different types of animals we deal with, the only ones where one-way doors can be used on a regular basis (excluding some of the rare situations) include:
If you’ll notice, most of those animals listed are the common “burrowers” of New England. That is where most of the one-way door use comes into play for us. Underneath sheds, decks, porches, and home additions without full foundations. There is no relocation of wildlife allowed per state law in Massachusetts. There are reasons for it, which we will not get into here. That is a state by state decision.
So the use of one way doors is really the only consistent way to evict/remove the animals without having to euthanize them, which is a very sensitive topic to a lot of people. I enjoy using the one way doors because they will create long lasting solutions when used in conjunction with full exclusions, as opposed to people or companies who just want to trap and remove all of the problem animals. That problem will not end unless you address where they are getting in. They are excellent tools when used in the right circumstances, and can even be used by homeowners when installed correctly, in conjunction with full exclusion to prevent entry from other locations.
There are specifics to know with any species though, in terms of their ability to chew or fight through material, how hard they are typically known to try to re enter, how they’ll try to re-enter, and TIME OF YEAR in case there could be young inside (squirrels often have a second litter of young in late summer/fall). There is no worse situation than adult animals that have been sealed out (usually by homeowners) not knowing there are young present. Juvenile skunks dying under your porch or squirrel adolescents that haven’t left the nest in your attic yet are really awful situations to get calls for in the middle of it happening.
These are just a few of the reasons why professional wildlife control companies are necessary.