It is two in the morning in Burlington, the house is quiet, and above the bedroom ceiling something is scratching. Then it moves. You are wide awake now, asking the only question that matters tonight: what is that? The good news is that the sound itself is evidence. Read it properly and you will usually know what you are dealing with before anyone opens the attic hatch.
Start with the clock, then the weight
Timing is the best first clue, because attic animals keep different hours — and after timing, how heavy the sound is narrows it further:
Heavy thumping and slow, deliberate movement at night — think raccoon. A raccoon is a big animal, roughly the weight of a small dog. What you hear is walking, thumping and sometimes dragging, and a family group can add chattering sounds. This is raccoon removal work: raccoons are nocturnal, strong, and quite capable of tearing at vents, soffits and roof edges to get in.
Faint, light scratching at night, especially inside a wall — think mice. Mice are nocturnal too, but much lighter. The sound is intermittent scratching, short scurries and sometimes a steady gnawing, and it often seems to come from inside a wall rather than across the open ceiling. That pattern is mice removal work, not a big-animal job.
Fast scampering in the morning and late afternoon — that is a squirrel, and tonight is not its shift. Squirrels are daytime animals. If the noise over your ceiling is a morning and daytime pattern, you are likely hearing a squirrel leaving and returning — see squirrel removal — and a quiet night does not mean the attic is empty.
Soft fluttering or chirping around dusk — possibly bats. Bats are another night sound, usually lighter and closer to the entry point. Bat work has its own timing rules in Ontario, which is one more reason the animal has to be identified before anything is sealed.
One sound alone does not confirm anything. The pattern over a night or two — when it starts, how heavy it is, and whether it repeats in the same place — is what an inspection is built on. Ontario’s own guidance on preventing conflicts with small animals starts from the same place: identify the animal and secure the openings, in that order.
Do this tonight
You cannot fix an attic entry at 2 a.m., and you do not need to. Tonight’s job is information:
Note the time, the room, and the pattern. When did it start, where is it loudest, is it heavy or faint, does it move or stay put? Write it down — this is exactly what you will be asked on the phone.
Listen again the next night. A sound that repeats on a schedule is an animal denning, not a branch on the roof. One night can be a passer-by; two or three is a tenant.
Look from the ground in the morning. Walk the outside of the house and look up: a lifted or chewed roof vent, a gap at a soffit corner, a hole at the roof edge, droppings below an opening. Photograph anything you find — from the ground. No ladders at night, no roof walks.
Keep kids and pets out of the attic space. Do not send anyone up to investigate in the dark. A cornered raccoon is a bite risk, and droppings and nesting material are not something to stir up without knowing what left them.
That is tonight’s whole list. Everything else happens in daylight, with the animal identified.
Not that: the three mistakes that make it worse
Do not seal the hole. This is the big one. If you close the entry while the animal is still inside, it does not disappear — it dies in the attic or chews a new way out, often through something far more expensive than the original hole. If there are young inside, sealing makes it worse again. Sealing is the last step of a removal, never the first.
Do not put out poison. Poisoned animals die in wall voids and attic corners you cannot reach, and poison in an attic is a risk to pets and other wildlife. It also does nothing about the hole — the next animal walks straight in.
Do not ignore it and hope for spring. An animal denning for the winter is busy the whole season: chewing (wiring included, which is a genuine fire risk), tunnelling and packing down insulation, and widening the entry it uses every night. A November problem left alone is a bigger, more damaged attic by March.
Scratching in attic at night: how the job is actually done
Once the sound has been read, the work follows the animal, which is why identification comes first on wildlife removal in Burlington calls:
Inspect first. The roofline and the attic together: the entry being used, any backup gaps, nesting, droppings, and damage to insulation or wiring. The inspection confirms what the sounds suggested — or corrects it.
Get the animal out humanely, the right way for that animal. For a raccoon or squirrel, a one-way door fitted at the main entry lets it leave on its own and not get back in — nothing trapped, nothing sealed inside. Mice are different work: there is no one-way door for a mouse, so the job is finding and sealing the small entry points they use, once the inspection shows where they are getting in.
Seal every entry, not just the used one. Close one opening and an animal tests the next, so every gap found on the inspection is sealed in the same job.
Clean up what it left behind. Nesting material and droppings come out and damaged insulation is flagged, so the attic stops smelling like a den to the next animal that tests the roof.
How Regional Wildlife Services handles it
Regional Wildlife Services is owner-operated: Sean Thornton, 20+ years removing wildlife humanely, does the inspection and the work himself. On a night-noise call that matters — the person who hears your description is the same person who confirms what made the sound and seals the entry it used.
Frequently asked questions
I hear scratching at night but nothing during the day. What is it most likely to be?
Most often a raccoon or mice — both are nocturnal. Heavy, slow thumping points to a raccoon; faint, light scratching, especially in a wall, points to mice. Squirrels are daytime animals, so a strictly night pattern is rarely a squirrel. The pattern is a strong clue, and an inspection confirms it.
Should I go up and look tonight?
No. Note the time, the room and the pattern instead, and look at the roofline from the ground in the morning. Going into a dark attic to confront an animal you have not identified is a bite and injury risk, and it tells you less than a proper daylight inspection will.
Can I just block the hole I found this weekend?
Not safely, unless you are certain the attic is empty — and from the ground you usually cannot be. If the animal is still inside, blocking the hole traps it, and it will die in there or chew a new way out. The humane order is always: get it out first, confirm it has left, then seal.
How long can I leave it before calling?
A night or two of listening to confirm the pattern is useful. Weeks are not. Every night an animal dens in an attic it chews, nests and widens its entry, so the repair grows with the waiting. If the sound repeats, it is a tenant, not a visitor — that is the time to call.
Which towns do you serve?
Burlington and across the region — Oakville, Milton, Hamilton, Stoney Creek, Niagara and Georgetown.
Hearing scratching over the ceiling tonight?
Call Regional Wildlife Services at 905-320-8984. We take phone calls and bookings 7 days a week; service appointments run Monday to Friday typically, and weekend calls book jobs in for the following week. We serve Burlington, Oakville, Milton, Hamilton, Stoney Creek, Niagara and Georgetown. Note the time and the pattern tonight — then let us confirm what made it: contact us.
