Bat Removal Services in Gilbertsville, PA
Seitz Wildlife Services is a fully licensed, family-owned and operated company providing bat removal and wildlife control throughout Gilbertsville, Douglass Township, and the surrounding Montgomery County area. We handle the full range of bat situations property owners run into — bats in an attic, bats in a chimney, bats trapped behind shutters, and bats flying through living space. Our services also include bat guano and dropping removal, attic clean-outs, insulation replacement, bat house installation, and bat proofing, also known as bat exclusion.
Gilbertsville sees more bat activity than a lot of comparable communities, and the reason is the landscape. Swamp Creek and the low, wet ground of the historic Falkner Swamp area run right through this part of Montgomery County, and standing water and wetland produce insects in enormous volume. Bats follow the insects. A colony foraging over that ground at night needs a dry, undisturbed roost within easy range during the day, and the buildings along the Route 73 and Route 100 corridors are the closest thing available. If you’re dealing with a bat intrusion in Gilbertsville, contact Seitz Wildlife Services for a free phone consultation.
How Bats Get Into Gilbertsville Homes
Gilbertsville has two distinct kinds of housing, and bats exploit each of them differently. Knowing which one you own tells you a great deal about where to look.
Older stone farmhouses and barns. Douglass, New Hanover, and the surrounding townships still hold a good number of eighteenth and nineteenth century stone homes, bank barns, and outbuildings. These have large open attic volumes, mortar joints that have loosened over two centuries of freeze and thaw, gaps where the roof framing meets a stone gable end, and slate or wood shake roofing with lifted edges. They are, from a bat’s perspective, close to ideal — spacious, stable in temperature, and full of entry points. Maternity colonies in this area frequently settle in exactly these structures.
Newer development housing. Much of Gilbertsville was built out from the 1980s onward, and those homes fail in different places. Ridge vents with degraded or improperly seated caps, gable louver vents with damaged screening, gaps at soffit returns where the roofline changes pitch, and the joint where a chimney chase meets the siding are the usual culprits. Bats only need a gap the width of a finger, which is why these openings go unnoticed for years — nothing about them looks like a hole. Newer homes also tend to have tighter, lower attic space, which means a colony is far more likely to be heard through the ceiling.
What Makes Bats Dangerous?
Bats are valuable outdoors and genuinely important to the local ecosystem, but once they’re inside a structure they bring real risks. Bats are known carriers of rabies, and any physical contact with a bat should be avoided. If you or someone in your household has had contact with a bat, consult a physician about the potential rabies exposure.
Bats also eat close to their own body weight in insects nightly, and in a wetland-adjacent area like Gilbertsville that appetite is well fed — which translates directly into guano accumulating in the roost. Concentrated guano saturates attic insulation and building materials and becomes a legitimate health concern. It can produce mold spores that, when inhaled, are associated with lung infections and a disease called histoplasmosis. Bats cornered in tight spaces may also behave defensively, which is another reason to step back and call a professional rather than handle the situation yourself.
Live Bat Removal
Pennsylvania has a large bat population, and from time to time a single bat finds its way inside a home or business and becomes trapped. When that happens the safest move is to call in a professional for live bat removal. Attempting to capture a bat yourself is not advisable given the rabies risk. If physical contact has already occurred, the bat may need to be captured alive and submitted to the county health department for rabies testing — we can safely contain it for that purpose when testing is required.What Can Seitz Wildlife Services Do?
Professional Bat Exclusion in Gilbertsville, PA
Bat exclusion is the process of inspecting and sealing a structure that bats have infiltrated, with the goal of permanently preventing further entry. Bats squeeze through remarkably small gaps, which makes it very difficult for a property owner to identify every access point unassisted — particularly on the older stone buildings common around Gilbertsville, where the openings are often high, irregular, and only visible from a ladder.
Bats are protected by law in Pennsylvania, and our exclusion work is fully humane. We never use poisons or harmful chemicals. By installing one-way doors, we allow the bats inside to exit the structure while preventing them from returning, leaving the building bat-free. Exclusion is demanding work that typically requires high ladder access and real construction skill to diagnose and resolve correctly. We complete every job with high quality materials built to hold up for years, and we back the work with a long-term guarantee against future infestations. We get the bats out and keep them out.
Bat Attic Clean Out
The clearest sign is watching bats emerge from a building at dusk. Bats are creatures of habit and return to the same roost each evening, so a single evening spent watching the roofline usually confirms it. Other common indicators include:
- Droppings accumulating in the attic, along walkways, on window sills, or on siding below an entry point
- Squeaking, scratching, or rustling in the attic, chimney, or wall cavities, most noticeable at dusk and again before dawn
- Dark greasy staining around a gap, vent, or gable end, left by bats repeatedly passing through the same opening
- A persistent musty ammonia odor in upper rooms
- Bats appearing inside living space
When Is the Best Time for a Bat Exclusion?
Timing matters, both legally and for the survival of the colony. Bats are protected in Pennsylvania, with several species classified as endangered, and exclusion devices cannot be installed between mid-May and August 1st. That window is when maternity colonies are raising their young, and sealing a structure during it traps flightless pups inside — which kills them and leaves you with a far worse problem in the attic than the one you started with.
Exclusion work can be completed in the spring before the young are born, or from August 1st onward once the young bats are strong enough to leave the roost with the colony. If you discover bats during the restricted period, it’s still worth calling — we can inspect the property, document the entry points, handle any bat that gets into living space, and have the exclusion scheduled for the first day the work can legally begin. Hibernating bat populations across the Northeast have suffered severe losses from White Nose Syndrome, so avoiding additional harm to the species matters. Contact Seitz Wildlife Services to schedule your Gilbertsville bat exclusion at the right time of year.