Visitors in the Walls and Attic

NOTE: This post is a fine example of real estate agents being “real people” too.

I work from home quite a bit and have an office on the third floor of our house. A couple of weeks ago I was at my desk and I heard a scratching noise coming from the inside of the wall.

Hmm. What could that be? I crossed my fingers that a squirrel had not made its way into our attic and proceeded to *calmly* pound on the wall to see what would happen. The noise stopped. For about 3 minutes. Then the scratching started on another wall in the room.

Always the optimist, I’m hoping it’s just a mouse at this point. So I hop in my car, head to Wal-Mart for some old fashioned traps, and set them up with irresistible peanut butter in various locations in the walk-in portion of the attic.

I wait 3 days. No mice are caught and the scratching remains. It comes intermittently and in various locations. Pounding on the wall continues to be a very short term solution.

Kyle is officially called in to intervene. I don’t want to deal with some crazy animal that will gnaw off half my face when discovered. He doesn’t really want to either, but, well, he’s the boy and those are the rules.

Because we didn’t find anything in the walk-in part of the attic, he’s sent to the upper regions, requiring the use of a ladder. He’s got leather gloves on and all sorts of protective clothing. The hatch is lifted and set aside, he climbs up the ladder and kneels on the hatch.

There is a quiet squealing. Uh-oh. He accidentally squished the cause of the scratching noise.

The conversation then proceeds like this:

Kyle: Uh, I think I squished it.
Amy: What is it? Is it dead?
Kyle: I don’t know. I don’t really want to look.
Amy: You have to look! Do you want me to get a shoebox or something?
Kyle: Yeah, get a box. I don’t know what it is.
Amy: [goes to get shoebox, grumbling that she should have gotten shoebox before the expedition]
Kyle: It looks kind of like a mouse, but doesn’t appear to be a mouse. It’s got these weird membrane looking things.
Amy: Like wings?
Kyle: Like wings.
Amy: A bat? That’s what was making the scratching noise?
Kyle: Yep, a bat. And I bet he has friends. I’m outta of here…

So we officially have bats in our attic. I’m not really inclined to do anything about them because we don’t ever go up there.

The scratching on the wall continues. I’ve stopped my pounding and have resorted to telling the bat(s) that they’re welcome to remain. I’ll stay on my side of the wall if they’ll stay on theirs.

ANOTHER NOTE: We do have pictures of the bat, but the writer of this post feels they are too morbid to post.