On 12/14/2004 5:23 PM US(ET), Roger took fingers to keys, and typed the
following:

The bats could make their way into the attic through small holes where the
screen
was stapled to the wood vent.

After they left for the season, I took out the gable vent, attached
screening to the
outside, and made it impossible to get back in. This seems to have worked
fine.

I'm about to have my house vinyl sided and I'm thinking of having the
gable
vent
closed up with plywood and siding over it. I really do want to deal with
bats
or other critters getting in.

My house is 12 years old. I have soffit vents, ridge vent, and a power
temp
controlled
roof vent (I had that put in when I had central air installed).

Many/most of the similiar homes in my neighborhood do not have gable
vents.
Does
it sound like I have adequate ventilation in the attic if I remove the
gable
vent?
There is no gable vent on the opposite gable (chimney on that side).



I would keep the gable vent. It is easy to keep varmits out of the attic,
but difficult to add a vent once you cover it.. A sturdy 1/4 inch galv.
screen hand-stapled to the interior is what you want. Don't use the tiny
staple gun staples, but the 3/4 - 1" galv. staples. If you have hot summers,
keep the vent, in any case.

I didn't have bats, but I did have many paper wasp nests between the
louvers and standard window screen that was tacked to the 2x4 box frame
around the square vent. I wanted to keep flying insects from entering my
attic, but I had left too much room between the louvers and screen (3-1/2").
They didn't get in any further than the screen, but there were so many
nests that they might interfere with ventilation. I wanted to install a
thermostatically controlled power vent, so before installing it, I just
removed the screen and about 20 nests, and then moved the screen to lay
flush against the inside of the louvers, and secured it with pieces of
lath stapled to the sides of the 2x4s.