There are many different repellents that are sold in the market that are supposed to get squirrels out of the attic. There are natural repellents as well as chemical ones, affordable ones and more expensive options. The general rule here is that not many of them have any real effect, but in some situations they will work. How can you know that you should try a repellent before moving onto other removal measures? Well, there are two main reasons, or better said, differences that will determine the level of effectiveness of the repellents: whether a squirrel mother has helpless, small babies and how many squirrels you are dealing with.



If a squirrel has babies, she will endure lots of stress and seeming danger because her mother instinct is primary here. In this case repellents will not be effective, so don't waste time with them when squirrel babies are still under two months old – it is not humane to try to get them out.

In the other case, when your home has been inhabited by more than one squirrel family, you will also not have much success with repellents. Even when you scare away a few, there will still be quite a few of them left.

Additionally, all the repellents you might find lose their effect after a certain period of time, especially if the rain washes them away. After all, natural or chemical, repellents are substances that after a short period of time evaporate and there will be no more repelling effect.

Repellents are usually made of mothballs, ammonia or with a high level of predator urine. There are also homemade recipes that suggest the usage of garlic or peppers. If squirrels try these out, they will not want to consume these again as this isn't a pleasant taste for them.

Other types of repellents are noise ones, which produce high-pitched or very loud noise that is supposed to scare squirrels away.

There are also repellents that use light, which are supposed to repel squirrels with strong rays of light.

Generally, it is true repellents rarely have much of a lasting effect. Squirrels are very protective of their offspring, so they will not be scared away by any amount of repellent if they have babies that are too small to move or care for themselves. This is why repellents are not of much use and why you should move on to some other measures to get squirrels away from your home.

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