Home Damage? What animals to watch for

While animals can be fun to interact with from a safe distance, you don’t want to deal with the kind of damage that they can inflict on your home and property.

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<a href="https://www.foundationrepairwesterncolorado.com/resources/which-animals-cause-damage/"><img alt="Which Animals Cause the Most Damage to Your Home" src="https://www.foundationrepairwesterncolorado.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/12/2020/08/which-animals-cause-damage-infographic-foundation-repair-western-colorado.png" width="600px" height="2761px" /></a><br><a href="https://www.foundationrepairwesterncolorado.com/resources/which-animals-cause-damage/">Which Animals Cause the Most Damage to Your Home</a> Created By: <a href="https://www.foundationrepairwesterncolorado.com/"> Foundation Repair of Western Colorado</a>

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Some of the animals that can cause the most trouble for homeowners in Grand Junction, CO, include:

• Skunks – Few things are more annoying to deal with than a skunk’s smell. If a skunk ends up frightened near your property or when trapped inside your home, you may find yourself dealing with that scent for months.
• Rodents – This category is broad and includes squirrels, chipmunks, mice, and rats. All of these creatures, when the weather starts to turn, may try to make their way into your home. There, they can settle in your walls, play with your insulation, and chew your electrical wires down to nubs.
• Snakes – Snakes don’t pose much of a structural threat to your home, but that doesn’t mean they can’t cause trouble. Snakes can settle in your pipes or in the dark corners of your basement or crawl space. Here, they can strike against people and pets they deem a threat to their existence. You should never try to remove a snake from your property on your own. Instead, you’ll want to reach out to animal control for guidance.
• Raccoons – It’s difficult to say whether or not raccoons intentionally like to cause trouble. Regardless, they certainly have a knack for it. If a raccoon gets into your home, you may not only have to deal with their rapid reproduction but their play as well. Raccoons can tear into your insulation, purposefully gather precious belongings close to them, and make a mess of your home.
• Bears – In Grand Junction, CO, you’re as likely to encounter a bear on your property as you are a deer or a skunk. A bear’s primary threat to your property is its size. Bears tend to wield their bodies without thought for property value. As such, a bear looking to scratch its back may accidentally break a wooden support beam on your front porch. Alternatively, a bear following a curious scent may damage your front door or garage. The damage they leave behind isn’t intentional, but it can be long-lasting and severe.
• Pigeons – Pigeons and other types of birds can nest in your gutters and redirect the water therein. If water starts to run down toward your foundation, it can add to the hydrostatic pressure already impacting the materials there and cause cracks to form all the faster.
• Deer – Deer are generally non-aggressive creatures that, like bears, don’t know their own size. A herd of deer wandering through your yard may cause damage to your structural supports, lawn ornaments, or other home features simply by stepping on them in an attempt to move on to their next preferred location.
• Groundhogs – Groundhogs dig by nature. If a groundhog determines that your home is the safest place for them to live, you’ll have to deal with the consequences of those digging pests. Groundhogs can dig burrows up to 45 feet long. If these burrows tunnel under your foundation, the soil under your home as well as your slab may begin to sink into the open space.
• Bats – Bats aren’t a danger to the structural supports inside your home. Rather, they can introduce you and your family to unwanted bacteria and guano.
• Woodpeckers – Woodpeckers will riddle your wooden structural supports with holes in an attempt to find food and shelter for themselves. Even though these birds can be beautiful to watch, you’ll want to shoo them away or invest in means to discourage them from interacting with any unprotected wood on your property. You can direct them toward your trees if you’re willing to share your land with them.
• Vultures – Vultures are more common in Grand Junction, CO, than they are in many other parts of the United States. These birds love to play with items they find stimulating, including shiny shingles and lawn ornaments. If you leave items like these unprotected around your home, vultures may readily snap them up or otherwise damage them.

These animals and others may wreak havoc around your home, but you don’t have to let that damage sit. You can collaborate with animal control as well as the foundation, basement, and crawl space repair professionals in your area to remove an unruly animal from your property and start to repair any damage they’ve inflicted.

To better understand what your repair budget should look like after an animal makes a mess of your home you can reach out to a local expert at Foundation Repair of Western Colorado for a home inspection and a free quote on the services you may need to restore your home’s value.