Before & After Photos

This homeowner in Highlands had wildlife gaining entry into his attic through a gable vent. The wire mesh screen covering the gable vents was damaged, most likely from the animals themselves. With the screen breached, they were able to gain access into the attic.

Homes are equipped with attic vents to provide efficient ventilation. They allow heat and humidity to escape from the attic in the summer and moist air in the winter. You’ll find vents on the underside of your soffits and on the home’s gables, which are the triangular portion of the outside wall of a house that comes to a peak between the edges of the intersecting roof pitches. Homes with a simple gable roof (two roof sections sloping in opposite directions that meet at the roof ridge), typically have gable vents at the two ends of the house, and sometimes over the garage. Homes with more ornate roof structures with multiple gables usually have multiple gable vents. While these vents are necessary for efficient attic ventilation, they often wind up being the “weakest link” in the roof structure for wildlife to gain access. Time and time again, our wildlife technicians have had to deal with infestations with wildlife that used a gable vent as their personal welcome mat to enter the attic. Once inside, wildlife can cause significant property damage. They can ruin expensive insulation and chew through wires, creating a fire hazard, and their droppings are a serious health hazard.

Two members of Cowleys home construction crew were sent in to do the exclusion work and make sure that, going forward, wildlife would be blocked from trying to re-enter the attic through this vent. We carefully removed the damaged screen and installed a new one.

A homeowner in Monmouth Beach, NJ, a small beach community at the Jersey Shore contacted Bird Solutions By Cowleys because of a serious nuisance bird problem. This homeowner, who lived right on the water, had seagulls anding on his roof, depositing their prodigious waste everywhere. Because of the location of the home, the roof was a perfect spot for the birds to roost and nest, and these high structures help them stay on the lookout for food and predators. Gulls are attracted to human habitats because they are opportunistic scavengers that will consume virtually anything.

Seagulls are protected migratory birds. Should these birds become a nuisance on your property, it’s all about setting up deterrents on your property to create a hostile environment for them. The objective is simple: You want the birds to “voluntarily” abandon your property and move on elsewhere. Because gulls nest in coastal regions, they are quite common along the Jersey Shore, and they often become one of the biggest bird nuisances for homeowners who live in Monmouth Beach and our other coastal towns. These birds eat far more than aquatic life. They are  In their search for food, when not in parking lots or garbage dumps, they are often attracted to roofs and other high structures. These are safe sites for them to roost and nest, and it gives them a great vantage point to stay on the lookout for food and predators.

Their droppings can cause significant property damage. Their thick white paste contains acidic uric acid, which is strong enough to dissolve shingles and sheathing. It can easily disintegrate roofing materials enough to cause roof leaks. Also, birds nesting in drains and gutters can block water drainage and lead to dangerous standing water on the roof. 

Because bird droppings contain parasites and other pathogens, they are also a serious health hazard. They are attracted to waste sites, eating garbage containing sewage or medical waste. They can transmit these pathogens in their droppings. That alone is a good reason to not have gulls hanging around your home.

A two-crew team from Bird Solutions carefully installed approximately 1700 bird spikes on the peaks of his roof. The photos show the “before and after” of the spike installation. Without a place to land, the birds soon give up and look for a more hospitable place to land. For these birds, there is no shortage of places to “hang out.” Effective bird control lets them know that your home is off-limits.

The Monmouth Beach homeowner was pleased to finally have these gulls vacate his property. Sea gulls are a potential nuisance in any coastal community. However, it is not something that homeowners have to tolerate.

Recently, our wildlife team was called out to a home in Shrewsbury, NJ, to remove bats that had infested the attic. The bats were infesting the attic by squeezing through the gable vent. A short while ago, we were able to successfully and safely remove all the bats from the home and disinfected the attic.

To prevent the bats from reinfesting the attic via the gable vent, we installed Pest-Blok over it. Pest-Blok doesn't restrict the airflow to the attic, undergoes a silicone-protected polyester coating process that makes it last longer, and guards the home against bats, squirrels, birds, and all other nuisance wildlife.

We returned to a home in Pennington, NJ, for a follow up inspection for mice. After we inspected every single one of the bait stations and replenished the bait in each one, it's now time to seal off the entry points. Exactly how were the mice able to infest the home? Through a small gap around a utility pipe. It may seem small, but because they have collapsible rib ages that can flex more than most mammals, all a mouse needs is an opening the width of a pencil!

To properly exclude the home, we stuffed every single gap around the utility pipes on the exterior and interior of the home with Xcluder™ Fill Fabric and then sealed them with a premium, waterproof adhesive. Xcluder™ Fill Fabric is made from a blend of coarse stainless steel and poly fibers to form a highly resilient and impenetrable barrier against rodents and pests. Lastly, we scheduled several additional follow up inspections to replenish the bait in the bait stations and monitor the mice activity throughout and around the home. 

We've returned to this home in Pennington, NJ to check on the mice activity in the crawl space. After were inspected the home and replenished the bait in all the rodent bait stations, it was time to exclude the areas of the property that the mice were using to gain access into the home. What areas were they? They were several gaps around multiple utility pipes around the property.

To properly exclude the mice, we stuffed each opening with Xcluder® Fill Fabric. Mice hate the taste of metal and this will deter them from the areas as well as form a firm and tight barrier to keep the rodents out. Afterward, we sealed the Xcluder® Fill Fabric in place with a premium, waterproof adhesive. Now the home is properly excluded from mice.