As the mornings get colder and the leaves finish coming down, two very different pests are both thinking about the same thing: getting indoors before winter properly sets in. Across Lowdham, Burton Joyce, Calverton, Hucknall and Ravenshead, we’re seeing the usual autumn pattern repeat itself – grey squirrels pushing into loft voids from the woodland edges, and rats working their way toward sheds, garages and airbricks as the ground outside gets wetter and colder.
This week we’re leading with squirrels, since this is the time of year they do the most damage, but rats aren’t far behind – and in these particular villages, the two problems often show up on the same street within a few weeks of each other.
Grey squirrels: Sherwood Forest and Rufford on one side, the Trent Valley on the other
Hucknall and Ravenshead sit right on the edge of Sherwood Forest and the Rufford estate woodland, which means a steady supply of grey squirrels looking for a warm, dry place to build a winter nest once the trees thin out. Older properties backing onto the forest edge or the golf courses around Ravenshead are particularly exposed – squirrels will use overhanging branches, loose fascia boards or gaps where a roofline meets a chimney to get into the loft space.
Lowdham, Burton Joyce and Calverton have their own version of the same problem. The hedgerows and mature trees along the Trent Valley and Dover Beck, plus the pockets of woodland around Calverton (a village that’s still got a lot of green space left over from its colliery days), give squirrels plenty of cover right up to the back of people’s gardens. Once they’re in a loft, they don’t just nest – they gnaw. Electrical wiring, water pipes and roof timbers are all fair game, and a chewed cable in an insulated loft space is a genuine fire risk, not just an inconvenience.
Signs to listen and look for: scratching or rolling noises in the loft, especially around dawn and dusk when squirrels are most active; chewed loft insulation pulled into a rough nest shape; and small entry gaps at roofline level that weren’t there last year. Squirrels are surprisingly strong for their size and will enlarge a gap that’s already started rather than looking for a different way in.
Rats: sheds, garages and airbricks as the weather turns
Rats follow a simpler logic – as outdoor food sources (fallen fruit, compost heaps, bird feeder spill, allotment scraps) dry up and the weather turns, they move toward anywhere warm, dry and close to a reliable food source. In Lowdham and Burton Joyce that often means gardens backing onto the river or the beck, where rats have been moving along the banks all summer and simply follow the water inland as temperatures drop. Calverton’s older outbuildings and allotment plots see the same pattern.
Around Hucknall and Ravenshead, we tend to see rats taking advantage of ex-colliery terraces with older brickwork and slightly larger gaps around airbricks and pipework, as well as sheds and garages that back onto green spaces. A rat doesn’t need much of a gap – if you can fit a pencil into a hole, a rat can usually get its head in, and where the head goes the body generally follows.
The giveaway signs are usually droppings (dark, pellet-shaped, often along a regular route such as skirting boards or shed edges), a greasy smudge mark where a rat has repeatedly squeezed through the same gap, and distinctive scratching sounds from wall cavities or under floors, usually at night.
Why DIY traps and poison often don’t solve it
Shop-bought traps and bait can knock back a small, visible problem, but both squirrels and rats are genuinely difficult to deal with properly without professional tools and experience. Squirrels are a protected species in terms of how they can be dealt with once trapped – grey squirrels cannot legally be released elsewhere, so trapping without a clear, legal plan for what happens next can leave you in a difficult position. Rats breed quickly enough that a partial job (killing some, missing the nest or the main entry point) just means the population bounces back within a few weeks, often larger than before.
A proper visit identifies every entry point, not just the one you happened to notice, and deals with proofing as well as removal – because catching the animals currently inside doesn’t stop the next ones finding the same gap next month.
What to do if you’re hearing noises in the loft or walls
If you’re in Lowdham, Burton Joyce, Calverton, Hucknall, Ravenshead or anywhere else across Nottingham and you’re hearing movement in the loft or noticing droppings in the shed or garage, it’s worth getting it looked at before the problem escalates over winter, when both squirrels and rats are at their most determined to stay indoors.
NestBusters covers the whole of Nottingham and Nottinghamshire, with proper proofing as well as removal so the problem doesn’t just come back. Give us a call on 0742 984 9483 or visit nottinghampest.co.uk to book an inspection.
