A church near Bangor has undergone major repairs after parts of its roof were nibbled away by squirrels.
Experts were recently called in to repair the damaged roof at St Tegai’s Church in Llandygai, which involved replacing damaged parts of roof lead.
During the work specialists discovered teeth marks in the lead work, and holes where the grey squirrels had been using the roof to grind down their teeth.
Squirrels, like all rodents, have front teeth that grow constantly, and are worn down by biting on hard surfaces. They can cause damage when they enter roof spaces of houses and buildings by gnawing on woodwork and ceilings, striping insulation from electrical wires and tearing up fibreglass insulation.
The church’s roof project architect Geoff Stott, from Paterson Macaulay and Owens, told the BBC: “We couldn’t believe it at first, but the little devils had been getting on to the roof and chewing the lead work.
“There are grey squirrels in the woods nearby, and it appears they were using overhanging trees close to the building to get on to the church itself.”
He said they knew it was definitely squirrels to blame as “there were actual nibbly teeth marks on the lead on the church”.
“There are a few places where they’d actually made holes in the lead – I just hope that they haven’t suffered any lead poisoning because of this,” he said.
He added that he had not come across problems caused by squirrels until the past three or four years and had seen “similar things elsewhere recently”.
As well as the squirrel damage, the lead work on the church roof was generally thought to be in poor condition and some of the parapet walls also needed repairing.
Mr Stott added there was “still lots of work to be done”.
