How Do Grey Squirrels Get Into Loft Spaces?

Getting Onto the Roof

An overhanging branch is the commonest. Squirrels will jump a couple of metres horizontally and considerably further downwards, so a branch that does not touch the building is still a route if it is close and higher.

After that: a downpipe, a trellis, a climbing plant on a wall, a boundary fence running to the building, and a neighbouring roof at a different height. Brickwork alone is enough for a squirrel on many older properties.

Getting In: The Five Usual Points

The eaves, where the roof meets the wall and the felt has torn or was never carried far enough. A lifted or slipped tile, particularly at a hip, valley or ridge. The soffit, either at a joint or where it has rotted. The gable end, where the barge board meets the roofline. And the junction where an extension or bay roof meets the main building — the single most common one we find.

Any of those can be an opening of only a few centimetres to start with. Squirrels enlarge them.

What They Chew Through

Softwood fascia and soffit, roofing felt, plastic vents, insulation, and lead flashing. Also electrical cable, which is the part that turns a noise complaint into a genuine fire risk and is the reason not to leave it a fortnight.

They gnaw continually because their incisors grow continually. It is not damage caused by trying to get somewhere — a squirrel in a loft chews because that is what squirrels do.

How to Tell It Is Squirrels and Not Rats

Time of day. Squirrels are active in daylight, particularly early morning and late afternoon. Rats and mice are night-time. If you are hearing heavy movement at eight in the morning, that is not a rodent problem in the usual sense.

Weight, too. Squirrels sound like something rolling or dragging rather than scurrying, and you will often hear a single animal moving decisively rather than several moving quickly.

Which Openings Can Be Closed, and Which Need a Roofer

Closeable within a proofing hour: a soffit joint, a small eaves gap, a vent, a gap at a bay or extension junction. Those get mesh or metal and hold.

Not closeable that way: a whole eaves course that has failed, rotten fascia or soffit boards, slipped tiles needing re-bedding, or a roofline that has moved. Those are a roofer, and proofing them would be taking your money for something that will reopen.

And in every case: the animals come out first. Sealing a loft with a squirrel inside gives you a much worse and more expensive problem.