From the heath to the roof line
Grey squirrels are just as agile moving through tree canopies and along garden fences as they are on the ground - the same pattern holds near Woolwich, where dense converted flats and former barracks buildings. Houses close to Blackheath's mature trees, or the parkland around Eltham Park, usually have a branch overhanging the roof that acts as a bridge, and from there the squirrel needs only a weak spot at the eaves.
Blackheath's mature trees
The open heath and its bordering streets put squirrels within easy reach of a great many nearby rooflines, particularly the older houses closest to the heath itself. It's worth checking the eaves each autumn, ahead of squirrels looking for winter shelter once the weather turns, much as it does near Blackheath, where georgian and Victorian houses around the heath.
Eltham Park and Greenwich Park
The parkland around Eltham Park, and the historic trees within Greenwich Park itself, give squirrels a similar route onto the housing that borders each, even where individual gardens have fewer mature trees of their own.
Confirming it is a squirrel
The timing of the activity is usually the clearest tell, just as near Greenwich, where the Georgian maritime core around the park and the river. Squirrels keep daytime hours, so scampering and thumping around dawn and again in late afternoon points to them; anything happening in the dead of night is more likely rats or mice, as anyone near Greenwich will recognise, where the Georgian maritime core around the park and the river.
Checking for damage
Shine a torch in from the hatch without climbing inside, and look for flattened or shredded insulation, gnawed timber, chewed boxes and droppings near the water tank, much as it does near Plumstead, where victorian terraces on rising ground. If cable has been gnawed, that's the most serious sign, bare wiring is a fire hazard, so don't touch it and get an electrician out, true near Thamesmead too, where large postwar estates built around lakes and waterways on the borough's eastern edge.
What not to do
- Block the entry hole while squirrels may still be inside; they chew a new way out, sometimes into the house
- Put down poison in the loft
- Catch a squirrel and release it elsewhere
One point is purely legal rather than practical, grey squirrels are classed as invasive non-natives, and releasing a trapped one back into the wild is illegal, as anyone near Thamesmead will recognise, where large postwar estates built around lakes and waterways on the borough's eastern edge.
Booking squirrel control in Greenwich
Our squirrel trapping service in Greenwich is £280, and since around Kidbrooke, where a mix of older estate housing and newer riverside-style apartment developments under the Kidbrooke, it helps to say when you book squirrel control whether the sounds are by day or night and whether trees overhang the roof, with more on the Greenwich squirrel control page.
