I have a mouse, apparently, which means if you have a mouse you actually have mice. I should back up.
A couple weeks ago, I found two dead mice in the basement. I picked them up, threw them in the trash, yelled out “Solid work mate” to Steve, and went about my business. Today, I was cleaning up the kitchen, and I threw a bunch of leftover duck sauce and soy sauce packets from yesterday’s Chinese into the drawer where I keep that kind of shit. You know the kind of drawer I am talking about, because everyone has one. It has condiments and seasonings and unused disposable chopsticks and a couple random bandaids and some batteries (probably all dead) and that kind of shit. You never actually use anything in that drawer- you just put things in it that you are not ready to throw out YET, and then once a year you open it and say “MY GOD THIS IS A DISASTER” and throw everything out.
At any rate, I opened that drawer, and I saw shredded seasoning packets and mouse poop and all sorts of mess. So here is where my headspace is.
I don’t like to kill things. I definitely do not like to kill things with poison. And while I know that you definitely do not want mice in your house, at the same time, I have seen too many tv shows and cartoons and have anthropomorphized the little bastards to the point that I kind of like knowing that there is a mouse family in the house, much like I enjoy having birds nest on my front porch and the rabbit warren underneath the shed and the deer that visit the abandoned lot next door because I throw apples and stuff there.
So I think what I am going to do is just thoroughly scrub and sterilize all the drawers and cabinets and throw out anything that attracts the mice, make sure all dried goods are in impenetrable containers, and see if we can come up with an amicable living arrangement. They’re on their own with Steve, but I am willing to try out this non-aggression pact.
Bobby Thomson
If you eliminate the food sources they will leave. Just don’t get one of those glue traps.
Sab
Also too if you poison them you might inadvertantly poison Steve when he eats one.
schrodingers_cat
Trap and release it with cheese. Steve is sleeping on the job. Bad kitteh!
Lord Fartdaddy (Formerly, Mumphrey, Smedley Darlington Mingobat, et al.)
Yeah, mice are a hassle. I never knew there was so much they can eat until they got into my late grandmother’s house after she died and before my parents retired down there. They eat… Well, shit, I think it’s easier to reel off everything they won’t eat than it is to name what they will.
Keith P
You’re kind of limited with a cat, particularly if your cat isn’t a mouser (two of mine were born as farm cats, so they’re master killers). Your best bet is honestly one of those black plastic traps that you can let without catching your hand. And it’ll need to go somewhere that Steve absolutely cannot get.
Just accept that you’re going to have to kill some mice.
Sab
@Bobby Thomson: Those glue traps are horrifying. Unbeknownst to me our Orkin guy put one down in my dad’s basement against my express orders. The little guys were stuck there for at least two days without food or water before I found them. No way to get them unstuck.
I’m going back to the respite thread.
dr. bloor
We never use poisons or set traps, as we don’t really mind them all that much and the cats usually keep things from getting out of hand. One time, we had to coax a baby chipmunk out from underneath the radiator, through the kitchen, down two flights of stairs out the back door once with a broom and dustpan (cats were eager to point him out and supervise the removal, but didn’t really seem to regard him as prey). He was kind of cute, but obviously a little anxious about what was happening.
Tell Steve to get off his ass or you’re getting him a roommate.
A Ghost To Most
Mice have to be imported into our house, and they are with regularity. Still better than birds.
Mohagan
Those are brave (or inexperienced) mice. I’ve found that often just having a cat (and the smell of a cat) around will keep the mice away. I had a mouse in the kitchen once; they found my kitchen towel drawer perfect for nesting and ate the bristles off my silicone basting brush. Finally caught it and got it outside after a few days. I think it was a refugee that had been caught by a cat, brought inside, and then managed to escape the cat and was stuck in the house.
frosty
We’ve had mice from time to time. The best one was when they were living inside the dishwasher door. Run the dishwasher, mouse poop down the drain!
OTOH you don’t want one dying under the fridge next to the fan.
Cheryl Rofer
My experience is that mice have no sense of coexistence or boundaries. My answer to that is snap traps, which work well, but you will have to put them where Steve can’t get to them. That drawer would be good.
If you’re determined to try coexistence, your plan is probably as good as it gets. But they do chew through everything and can squeeze through really tiny spaces. Also, their pee can contain hantavirus.
wvng
@Keith P: I agree that the black plastic snap traps work well. We use them for rats in the barn, and they take the edge off until that moment when they can’t keep up and we have to use poison because it can just get horrifying. Hate using poison, but it’s that it get overrun. We have never had a cat that would kill rats, even our best mousers. Rats are scary. They are also beautiful and smart and we hate having to kill them.
Percysowner
@Keith P: Mine is a rescue, so no idea where he learned, but boy can he hunt. I have a pet door for him and the dog (fenced yard) and come spring I have to lock it at night otherwise I get “presents” of chipmunks, bunnies and other assorted critters. Cat thinks I must be hungry and is trying to keep his dumb human fed. Mice would have zero chance in my house.
Steve, this is your job! Go do it!
I’ll add to the chorus, no traps, and definitely no poison, both the dogs and Steve could be at risk.
Another Scott
@schrodingers_cat: In my experience, catch and release doesn’t work. Unless you can figure out how they’re getting in – they’ll just keep coming back (and making more).
We had to call an exterminator. He used this. I’ve made sure that our dog Ellie (who eats everything) never gets near it (and we don’t put any outside).
I’d be nervous about using it with a cat, though.
My $0.02.
Cheers,
Scott.
Keith P
I used to share a house with a roommate, and we’d constantly have dish sponges vanish. We each thought the other was throwing them out. Then we’d hear mice above our adjacent bathrooms. Then he’d have dreams about mice in his bed. Then he pulled his sheets back one day, and a mouse shot out. He wound up moving the fridge because the floor was sagging, and there was a pile of chewed up sponges behind it. I even had one crawl on me as I was cutting vegetables. We killed them with traps. Had to set about 5 of them around the house and backyard, and after two weeks of *regularly* emptying/resetting them, they were gone. Fastest time to have to reset a trap was 30 seconds – I set a trap, and heard it go off as I was walking away.
MattF
Once, when I was a grad student, I was waliking by the psychology building– someone opened the building door and a white mouse ran out. Made it out of the big maze!
Chief Oshkosh
Get rid of the food source? Ha, that’ll be a neat trick. Sure, give that a try, but now that they’re in the nice, warm house, they’ll stay for some time, as in, until Spring and warmer weather.
As to those on the blog who are dinging Steve, your experience may vary, but I’ve observed over the decades that indoor pets don’t recognize varmints as anything other than new, smaller indoor pets. It even holds true for outdoor pets. I grew up in the country and we had many indoor/outdoor cats, and full-on, barely-domesticated, outdoor cats. Those guys were the terror of rodents outside and in the out buildings, real killing machines, but oddly, never raised an eyebrow when in the presence of mice inside the house. Heck, I once watched a mouse who had just gorged itself on sunflower seeds in the pantry waddle across the kitchen, right in front of the second-most-effective mouser we ever had. Slipped behind a cabinet, thus letting me know where the little buggers were. Though the cat kept a steady bead on the mouse, she didn’t even twitch a whisker. This same cat made a habit of bringing us half-eaten varmints from outdoors several times weekly in the Spring and Summer. Usually left them at the back door, a small, squishy “mine” laying in wait for the unsuspecting occupant heading out to do morning chores…
zhena gogolia
We’ve been using this. It seems to work — at least we haven’t seen any mice or traces of mice in quite a while.
https://www.amazon.com/Mighty-Mint-Peppermint-Rodent-Repellent/dp/B07HYP6D5C/ref=sr_1_4?keywords=peppermint+oil+rodent+repellent&qid=1581275929&sr=8-4
Mikeindublin
Snap traps with peanut butter.
they cannot resist the stuff and can’t grab it without setting them off
Supernovabetty
Snap traps are your best bet, you do not want mice in your house, they’re a disease risk. The snap traps kill almost instantly, had to set some outside last year when the chipmunks got out of control, the neighbor lets them live in her garage and feeds them so the population is just crazy. They even make snap traps that are enclosed in a box so cats/dog/kids can’t trip the. But mice go right inside. Never used em but seems like a good solution.
White & Gold Purgatorian
You might want to look around the outside of your house and try to figure out how they are getting inside. Apparently a hole or crack the size of a pencil can provide entry. I’ve used a lot of steel wool (stainless is best) combined with spray foam, then topped with caulk and paint later, to reduce mouse presence in this rather old house. Also, we have 8 cats, many of whom are not interested.
Why is this worth doing? Because anywhere a mouse can enter, a snake can and will follow. Snakes follow the scent trails left by small rodents. Last spring I saw a 5 foot rat snake slide along our porch and then disappear — all of him — behind a batten of our board and batten siding. Yikes!! The snake stayed in there for 2 days, sticking its head out now and then. All the battens got the steel wool treatment after that. We haven’t seen a single mouse this winter and haven’t heard the usual rustling in the attic either.
smintheus
Mice will destroy non-food things as well, including eating the insulation around electrical wiring. They can get into forced air vents to build nests, chew holes in wood trim. They aren’t something you should encourage.
A bucket half filled with water can catch them, even large numbers at a time, as long as they can climb up to the lip of the bucket.
JaneE
Making sure there is no food for them (metal or glass containers) and trying to minimize the number of places where they can avoid Steve and be undisturbed may make them look for easier pickings. Make sure every crack and opening is sealed with something they won’t chew through. It may be a take a professional to mouse-proof your home and make it sealed tight. If Steve or any of the animals seem to be particularly interested in a spot, try looking for signs of mice there and make sure the area is securely sealed.
White & Gold Purgatorian
@Chief Oshkosh:
Yes. And if they don’t have proper food they’ll resort to chewing on textiles and/or chewing the insulation off your wiring. And leave a huge mess in your home’s insulation which doesn’t exactly enhance the R value.
Obvious Russian Troll
If you can figure out where the little bastards are coming in, close it up. We had to do that a few years ago with rats. Closed up some spaces in the garage, got rid of the food sources and all was good.
Years and years ago, I saw a mouse in my first house. It ran by both of my cats, who just kind of stared at it. I put out some traps but never caught anything.
Shortly before we moved out, I was replacing the furnace filter for the first time in way too long–and I found this tiny, mummified mouse embedded in the filter. Poor little guy. Wish the cats had gotten him first.
On another note, one of my neighbors has had a problem with raccoons getting in through her second-story cat door, but she’s not the most responsible pet owner. She leaves her cats out doors for weeks at a time when she goes on vacation–my next door neighbor ends up feeding them.)
schrodingers_cat
@Another Scott: Trap, release and seal the entry point.
WaterGirl
@Sab:
Now that should be a rotating tag.
painedumonde
You have already conceded.
Obvious Russian Troll
@White & Gold Purgatorian: Do the snakes chew on your insulation and wood trim, though?
Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism
We had mice in the garage once. They would go out to the bird feeders, collect the peanuts, bring them back to the garage, and stash them away. We finally learned where they had been stashing them when we opened the hood of the car to refill the windshield fluid, and peanuts poured out of the hood.
Percy (med-long hair brown tabby) brought one in from the garage once. She was great at catching and presenting, not so good at killing. So when she triumphantly set the mouse down in the living room, it didn’t hesitate to make a run for it. Of course, she was in hot pursuit.
The mouse ran directly at the elderly, giant, rangy orange tom, sphinxing and idly watching the youngster’s antics. The mouse dove directly between Alex’ front feet and burrowed under his chest. He stood up with a perplexed look, then put his head down between his front legs to watch the mouse run out between his hind legs and head for the kitchen.
Alex looked up just in time for Percy to dive between Alex’ front legs and squirm under him until she, too, had cleared his hind legs and could again pursue her quarry. He again put his head between his front legs to watch her travels, then looked at us with a clear expression of “did that really just happen?” He then ambled into the kitchen to critique her as she tried to catch the mouse again.
She ended up cornering it, which allowed us to catch it and get it back outside.
WaterGirl
Several years ago I found out I had mice when I opened the drawer to pull out a clean dishtowel and found mouse poop everywhere. Ugh.
They crossed the line. Clean dishtowels must be clean! It was them or me. I won.
Martin
Another vote for snap traps. It’s a bit hard, since we like pocket pets and have had pet mice/rats, but disease/damage…
Think of it a different way – wild mice/rats are like feral trumpers. Even though you like your friends and family in your house, you’re not going to bat an eye at setting those trumpers on fire.
Original Lee
Mousetrap Monday
I didn’t check to see if this site was recommended yet or not, so please forgive me if it’s a duplicate. This guy reviews mouse eradication and prevention devices. We had mice until I tried out one of the things he recommended, ultrasound plugins. We didn’t get the commercial grade, but rather the next level down that also have a nightlight. We haven’t seen a single mouse turd since.
Another Scott
@Martin:
I found that these work pretty well, and you don’t have to touch the unfortunate little monsters.
But there are a few brainiacs who can set it off and eat the peanut butter bait without getting caught. It can be a long process…
Cheers,
Scott.
taumaturgo
I found out the hard way that it is best to leave the eradication to professionals. Rats are extremely smart and adapt to survival. First, you must find and plug the pathways into your house. Once the holes are plug, then the traps are layout and check every few days. The idea is that the mice trap in the house will go feed at the traps and in a few weeks there should no active mice falling in the traps. The exterminator will then place poison traps on the outside of the property. The mice are free to eat the poison and leave to die someplace else. Once they have done these several times, they will most likely leave your area and try by your neighbors.
Mo Salad
Jawz traps. They set easier. They release dead mice easier. They kill instantly. It needs to be done. Sorry.
Baud
@White & Gold Purgatorian:
I rely on the snakes to deal with the mice.
mvr
As can their poop and saliva which dries and turns to dust. The dust from all of these three is the primary vector of infection for hantavirus. Every year it seems someone in Carbon County Wyoming is cleaning out a shed or barn and catches hantavirus. I suspect you need a good quantity of the dust to catch the infection, but I have put a lot of energy into making sure that any mouse that gets into my mountain cabin out there dies quickly. So far though, my hole finding and fixing process has kept them out for the 14 years since I built it.
@Cheryl Rofer:
JMG
We had a professional come to our house and he plugged a number of holes. He also had a device he placed on a couple of them where the mouse or other four-legged pest can get out, but is then unable to get back in. Been a year now without problems,
Mohagan
Talking about mice attracting snakes … Years ago I knew some people who lived in the country and their kids had guinea pigs. They also had more than their share of rattlesnakes show up near the house. Apparently guinea pigs smell like the biggest damn mice in the world.
satby
It’s possible to get humane traps and release them far away. And I’m on the board of a rescue org, so not a huge fan of killing animals either, but the last time I tried to seal up the food sources and hope they went elsewhere we ended up with mice eating non-food textiles, insulation, Preen pre-emergent weed killer (evidently corn based), a wool rug… You get the idea. When my son started setting snap traps they ended up killing and removing over 40 mice from the basement.
But never use the glue traps. Glue traps are unspeakably cruel.
VOR
We’ve had mice before on the ground level and basement. Now-deceased mama cat used to kill a few and then we wouldn’t see them anymore. I’d check all the food storage, the exterminator would check the exterior of the house, recommend moving some things, and lay down outdoor traps if needed.
My incompetent 16 year old male cat chased and killed a mouse in my second floor bedroom last October. I was surprised since I’d previously seen a mouse run across his paws with no reaction. The next day I found another dead mouse in the second floor bathtub. I assume the cat killed that one too.
But then I heard mice scrabbling around in the attic above my bedroom. Right above my bed where I could hear them while trying to sleep. That was a step too far. Called the exterminator, he put traps into the attic and garage. He said deer mice like attics and can climb inside your walls. He said there were signs of a whole nest, clearly more than just one or two.
Pete Downunder
Easy and humane way to catch mice: Get a long paper towel roll (or several toilet tissue rolls taped end to end to make a foot or so long tunnel. Put a dab of peanut better inside at one end. Carefully balance the roll on the kitchen bench so the end with peanut butter is hanging over the edge. Place a deep bucket underneath. Mouse will go through tunnel to get peanut butter and get tipped into bucket. Take bucket a good distance from house (a mile or two car trip is recommended). Release into the wild. Works really well.
ETA: typo
The Dangerman
Could be worse; somewhere in this world is one PISSED woodpecker.
Eunicecycle
@Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism: Our cat just brought one in the house a few weeks ago. I was suspicious when she sat looking under the stove for hours. My suspicion was confirmed when she brought the mouse into the bathroom and let it go. Hilarity ensued. We finally trapped it in a clear plastic bowl and took it outside. I guess that’s kind of cruel too because I live in Ohio and it was cold. But we figured we at least have him a chance. Oh, I knew she brought it in from outside because she had been leaving mouse carcasses on the back steps and we’ve seen no other signs of mice in the house.
satby
@taumaturgo: poison traps out side potentially kill whatever eats the pest that was poisoned too. I’ve been told owls and other birds of prey are poisoned when eating poisoned mice they’ve found.
White & Gold Purgatorian
@Obvious Russian Troll: Not sure. Are snake tooth marks bigger or smaller than mouse tooth marks?
LuciaMia
There are humane traps that work. Just dont release them into your backyard, they’ll just be back by nightfall. That was my morning ritual for a week when I had “guests”, driving over to a local park and releasing that days trapped mouse. My dog Kate loved those little trips.
germy
satby
This is uncomfortably reminding me I have something nesting in the soffit and eve of my roof, and it’s looking like a big bird, whatever it is. I have to call an exterminator when I get some money and since it’s way up high it’ll be expensive ?
Another Scott
@VOR: My dad and step mom had a big house on about 15 acres of land. They’d get big black snakes (rat snakes?) in the joists in the basement occasionally. They’d occasionally find empty snake skins hanging down, also too.
They knew they had mice, and put out traps and tried to deal with it the best they could. One apparently died in the wall behind the doorbell bells – there was a bad smell around it for a while, apparently until it dried out enough to no longer smell…
Mice are cut little buggers, but they belong outside. Along with the snakes!
Cheers,
Scott.
Spanky
I’ve been finding good-sized blacksnake skins for years along the foundation wall top, but we’ve had only one known mouse infestation, in the kitchen. These worked really well. A couple with peanut butter bait and placed under the sink would result in one or two captures a night. I’d just pick them up, walk down the street to the church, and let ’em go. Left to live, but poor as, well, church mice. No more mice after about 10 days.
The cats here never give a damn about real mice, only the catnip type. Now if you had a Jack Russell Terrier …
What Have The Romans Ever Done for Us?
@VOR: Yeah when I heard them in the attic near my bed gnawing on the drywall is when I called in the professional. I must have some seriously magic mice around me because they can and will lick the peanut butter off snap traps without setting them off. I’ve tried both the old Victor ones and the black plastic easy release ones with the recessed bait cups. How they’re even getting to the bait in those without setting them off I have no idea. But they do it.
White & Gold Purgatorian
@Original Lee: I used to have those ultrasonic doodads in every room. Seemed to help for awhile but then they moved back in. Maybe we were genetically selecting for deaf mice or something.
We messed around for decades with catch and release traps, repellers, herbal scented sprays and packets, not to mention cats. Would have been so much easier to just suck it up 25 years ago when my knees were better and crawl around outside stuffing up cracks and crevices with something they can’t chew through. Also had to get out the ladders and stuff up cracks and crevices at the top of walls and around windows because the little rascals can climb vertical walls with ease. Me, not so much.
Gvg
Rodents eat wiring insulation which can cause an electrical fire. I would not try coexistence. Your house is a valuable asset and so is your life and that of your pets.
i still recall visiting a hobby shop and asking about the renovations in the business next door. Squirrels ate the air conditioning duct work. Thousands of dollars damage.
i was once very ill and it was caused by a rat dying in my parents walls. The smell was awful as well but at least that clued us to the source of the problems. Sealing the chewed holes in the wood siding was a lot of work for my father. He put metal flashing on various places. The rat wasn’t poisoned, it just died, which happens naturally. You don’t want groups of mice living in your house, please.
trollhattan
We get rats in the attic and have a Spanish tile roof, making entry spot identification pretty much impossible. If they undergrounded our wiring the problem would go away but as things are they have their ready freeway and access to everybody’s house.
Another Scott
@LuciaMia: Unfortunately, one should check their local ordnances these days. E.g. Virginia:
:-/
Cheers,
Scott.
MagdaInBlack
My mother would tell the story of finding notes I wrote, at 8 y/o, to the mice…not to touch the food in the traps.
“They” wrote one back, thanking me for the warning ☺
LuciaMia
@Another Scott: Yes, Id thought about that. But thought it applied to larger critters like raccoons.
hitchhiker
The exterminator told us that they need dark, moisture, warmth, and food. As others have said, anything at all will do as food, so the effort to sterilize and seal everything is mostly for your own satisfaction. It’s curious that Steve got two of them … maybe the poop/shredding you noticed was caused by them before their encounter with him and you just now noticed the evidence that they’d been inside your kitchen & not just in your basement?
I have that drawer, but definitely weeks can go by without me looking at it.
trollhattan
@Another Scott:
West Virginia law: “Don’t drop no critters in the next holler. Two hollers over is fine.”
The Pale Scot
@Spanky:
That’s what I was thinking, where’s Rosie?
Ohio Mom
I know there are sometimes mice in the basement. They bring in acorns and leave the empty shells behind, and then there is the mouse poop hidden here and there.
But when I saw one bounding up the stairs as I carried a load of laundry down I yelled, “No, you do not get to go upstairs!” and that seemed to work. So I kinda get where John is coming from.
Now the squirrels in the attic, chewing holes in the sofits, they had to go.
Chris Pitchford
Long-time lurker, first-time poster…
The only effective tool I’ve seen are the ultrasonic repellers. You have to set them up judiciously, as multiple sources can cancel others out instead of reinforce them. So far in this thread I’ve one vote for and one against.
The resident cat and dog didn’t seem to be bothered, but they know they can’t vote.
Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism
@satby: Do you have wildlife specialists there? That’s what we called when we discovered bats in the attic vents. We had had them screened when the house was built, but they put the screens on the inside of the vent. The bats were hanging from the screen. He mounted a bat house for us and covered the vents so that they could get out but not back in. Came back a few days later, checked the vents, and permanently screened them on the outside.
Death Panel Truck
Well, if you weren’t so averse to killing, I would suggest a Rat Zapper. We have one, and it works great. I’m not wild about electrocuting them, but they’re vermin that spread disease.
We use dog kibble as bait in the zapper. They can’t quite reach it before stepping on the metal strip of death.
Another Scott
@LuciaMia: It may vary. Around here, there’s perpetual “open season” on “nuisance” animals (don’t need a license to kill them on your property), etc. Raccoons, opossums, ground hogs, mice, rats, a whole bunch of things are on the list.
We had a raccoon and an opossum living under a concrete slab at the top of our basement stairs for a while. We called a trapper to get them, thinking that they would catch the guys and release them somewhere else. Little did I know… :-/
A few years later, when we had some ground hogs in the back yard, I decided to just let them be, hoping the dog would eventually encourage them to leave. That worked.
But there don’t seem to be any qualifications about (normal) relocating any animals. (There must be some exceptions for bears and other apex animals, but not for most things.)
Cheers,
Scott.
Mai naem mobile
I have a friend who had a big problem and swears by this
https://www.lowes.com/pd/Bird-X-Transonic-Pro-Ready-to-Use-Pest-Repeller/3731937
It makes a sound at a pitch that can be heard by rodents. It says it only affects rodents – not dogs or cats.
beth
I’ve had two co-workers try to start up their cars only to pop the hood and find all the wiring’s been chewed through by mice. One of the car dealers said that a lot of car wiring is soy based these days and it attracts mice – don’t know if that’s true or not.
Noskilz
While mice are cute, interesting creatures that are fine outdoors, they are simply too destructive to try to get along with indoors and you would be wise to do everything you can to get rid of them. It could just be a minor incursion – even a few can make a real mess – but don’t take them lightly.
WaterGirl
@MagdaInBlack:
That is beyond sweet. Both on your part, and
your mom’sthe mice who wrote you back.I used to catch grasshoppers and take them for a ride in my bicycle basket because I thought they must get really tired from hopping everywhere they went.
MomSense
It’s all fun and games when they eat the contents of old seasoning packets in the junk drawer, but when they start chewing the wiring in your house, you will not feel so accommodating.
You have to prevent them from getting in and you have to trap them.
trollhattan
@beth:
Marmots! [insert Big Lebowski joke here] Trailhead parking lot marmots can wreck havoc in engine compartments, gnawing wires and radiator hoses. It gets so bad some places rent marmot fencing to put around your car.
Soybeans aren’t in any way involved in the marmot scourge.
More amusing to me are keas in New Zealand, which will pry off your wiper blades and window gaskets.
WaterGirl
@trollhattan: hahahahaha
Decades ago I worked with someone who gave me fits. A mouse got in to my house and my best friend and I saw the mouse running by while watching TV late one night.
He’s a physicist, so his idea was for us to put together the can and string trap like we would see in the cartoons and then we went back to watching TV. It actually worked!
So we caught the mouse – it was like 3am by this point – and we drove it across town and let it go right in front of my coworker’s house. Yes, I knew it was beyond likely that it would actually go into her house, but we got a good laugh out of it, and it made me feel better.
debbie
@Mai naem mobile:
They also make them for things like spiders.
Terese Day
There are live traps on Amazon. They work great. I put peanut butter on a spoon inside. Release them at least an acre away.
LuciaMia
@WaterGirl: There is an old folk-way tip that writing a letter to the mice, nicely asking them to leave is supposed to work.
WaterGirl
@LuciaMia: What can it hurt? ?♀️
Unless you wait forever for them to reply.
pinacacci
@Keith P: Thank you because your comment about sponges has solved a mystery that has plagued me for a while.
AnnMcC
Clean up and let Steve do his thing. It’s winter. It’s cold outside. They will leave in the spring.
MagdaInBlack
@WaterGirl:
You know if you hold them( grasshoppers, not mice) just right, along the side of their body, and give them a blade of grass, theyll eat it. Also an 8 y/o thing ☺
Barbara
Remove food sources, try to find where they are coming into your house and seal up holes that they can get through, which is nearly every hole. We use traps. You only need to catch a few before they seem to move on. They can be very destructive but if you keep on top of the situation it will probably be okay. They nearly destroyed my dishwasher by gnawing through the hose. We now wrap it in metal tape.
Adam L Silverman
A John Cole easy reader autobiography!
Sab
@Adam L Silverman: Your mouse looks more like a cat than a mouse.
ETA he has a round head and pointy ears. Mice have neither.
WaterGirl
@MagdaInBlack: I did not know that.
But surely the grasshoppers were hungry, and not just tired! So that’s a great discovery. :-)
WaterGirl
@Adam L Silverman: Second only to If You Give a Moose a Muffin, my personal favorite.
Zippity
I found evidence of a mouse in the trunk of my car one spring-a hole chewed into a bag of horse treats. I don’t like to kill them-I’ve rescued a bunch from my cats. So, I went and bought a no kill trap, and set it in a cookie tray in my trunk before I went to bed. Next morning, mouse in the trap, released it in the ravine next to my house and went to work.
I didn’t know how many mice were in my car, so I did it again the next night. Caught another one, repeat the process again. After the third night-it occurred to me that I might be catching the same mouse over and over again.
I got out my old aquarium with a lid, and set the mouse up with food/water and bedding, planning to try the trap in the trunk again. Two more nights-no more mice. I went to go catch the mouse in the aquarium and drive it to a park and found that she’d had five babies overnight.
I kept them for about three weeks, then drove all six to a park next to a ravine that was 2 miles from my house. I’m just really thankful I got her out of my car in time. I never found any more evidence of mice in my car.
Adam L Silverman
@Sab: Take it up with Felicia Bond.
https://www.amazon.com/You-Give-Mouse-Cookie-Book/dp/0060245867/ref=sr_1_2?crid=SGH3BPHIGOO6&keywords=if+you+give+a+mouse+a+cookie&qid=1581284995&sprefix=if+you+give+a+mo%2Caps%2C320&sr=8-2
namekarB
Cohabitation with mice and rodents can expose one to hantavirus and any decision to live among mice should be made with eyes wide open
Duane
@WaterGirl: Thanks for helping rid us of those drop-down ads. I really appreciate that.
Rand Careaga
My wife purchased a “sonic” unit during one of our mouse infestations. “You will observe,” I mansplained to her, “that nowhere on the packaging does it actually state explicitly that it repels mice,” (it didn’t) “and merely depicts an anthropomorphic mouse running upright with a distressed expression, clutching its ears.” That evening she deployed the thing on an outlet above the kitchen counter, and I placed a conventional jaws-o’-death trap half a foot away. Thirty minutes elapsed before snap!
The Crumbing Manse™ is over a century old, and seems prone to these incursions. Late in the last decade we let one of these kinda get away from us, and before we knew it, the thing had gone from a reconnaissance-in-force to the goddamn Normandy landings. We deployed Victor “Thunderfucker Mark IV” spring traps all over the house, and dispatched thirteen of the little bastards overnight, and another half dozen that week before we were satisfied that their armies had been withdrawn from the beachhead.
On another occasion I neglected to check on a trap for a couple of days after it engaged, and while the slain mouse had not begun to stink noticeably, its little corpse was pulsating. Ick.
WaterGirl
@Duane: Happy to do my part. They were hideous, weren’t they?
SC54HI
How timely. Just saw a small rat in the house last night, probably looking for food in a newly cleaned out kitchen cupboard. No live & let live for us — sorry, rat, you need to go. We’ll start with the tried-and-tested Victor’s wooden rat traps, baited with peanut butter. Hopefully, this will do it.
Warning: do NOT use Victor’s newer plastic rat traps. Not only are they more expensive but they generally maim or injure but do not kill. It is awful.
Cheap Jim
You have a car, sir. You enjoy death, but you insist on it being at second-hand. Get in there and kill. The mice want your rice, after all!
Gin & Tonic
@WaterGirl:
See, this is where punctuation can really help.
Gin & Tonic
@Rand Careaga:
You know why that is, certainly.
PW
@Bobby Thomson: I agree, the glue traps are cruel if the mice are left to die. But you can release the trapped mouse by pouring a little mineral oil onto the glue (you do this outside, obviously, somewhere you’d like the mouse to stay). You need to check the trap fairly often so they’re not trapped in there for days, but even a thoroughly glue-bound mouse can be released in this way. It’s nice to see the mouse run away.
Anne Laurie
One caveat, Cole: Aerosol mice poop is an allergen for a lot of people, even people who ‘don’t have allergies.’ It’s not impossible that some part of your recent nasal sufferings is due to having mice nesting somewhere you’re breathing in their effluence — in your bedroom, or behind your desk. (They’ll nest anywhere they can dig out an undisturbed cavity, and as long as you’re feeding cats / dogs indoors and birds on your porch, they’ll have a handy food source.)
Pacifism is a good philosophy, but for your own health, you may need to take measures inside your house. Talk to your doctor if you’re not sure…
oatler.
@Mikeindublin:
I baited some traps with peanut butter last year and little shits ate the stuff off them without setting off the traps.
Sab
@PW: Thank you. I did not know that.
PW
Duplicate comment deleted.
kingeider
drop trap. Get a tall cylinder of some kind, made of glass or metal, put peanut butter on top and then down in the cylinder just beyond mouse reach (5″, they can stretch!) put a ramp from one surface to the edge. Meeses will walk to the edge, eat the peanut butter, then try to get the rest, then drop down into the cylinder where you can get them the next day and send them out the door (we took ours to a wild park area, gave them some sunflower seeds and let them go.
Barbara
@Zippity: We found mice — mother and three babies — in our car. We didn’t try to trap, but we put an open box of moth balls in the compartment where we found them. Little critters hate aromatic smells. We never saw them again.
Mercuria
i live in an old house in NEPA. i was willing to co-exist with mice in the basement, but once they got into my living space, it was a bridge to far. as previously stated, they can be vectors for disease. i used an exterminator, sealed up what i was able, and it was years before i needed to call in the exterminator again. one note, if you are not willing to search out and remove the dead mice (i can’t, i don’t have it in me) don’t wait too long to have the exterminator come back. if you will be on vacation, have a neighbor let them in. i was away and ended up with flies swarming the basement.
Barbara
@Anne Laurie: We now put all of our animal food away for the night in a sealed container, including the dishes, and try to wipe down the area with a lemony cleaner. Any time we let up they are likely to reappear, but mostly in winter.
Sassygirl
@Sassygirl: The best thing you can do for mice or rats is to use peppermint oil spray . Spray wherever they’re at and They will leave your house I’ve had quite a bit of experience with mice and rats and it will really works and you don’t have to kill anything. By the way if you have one mouse you have more there’s never just one you just haven’t seen it.
Ruckus
John
Ask yourself one question, how do you think they’d feel if you moved into their house and shit all over the place?
Our shop was in LA, the old part of LA, the part that isn’t yet being rebuilt. The building is now 90 yrs old. I was in the storage shed at the back of the lot and came across two rats about the size of medium cats. They were not scared of me in any way. And my reaction was that if I wanted to kill them was it would take a pretty sharp (and long) knife or a gun. Any thing else would be inviting them to use you as a snack. I left them alone. Seemed the safest course.
LongHairedWeirdo
I’ve been told that cat urine – including litter box scooping – near mouse-entrances will repel them. It’s not the prettiest method, but I’ve been told it works.
(I don’t like my cats killing mice either, but I also view it as natural selection – I don’t feel I’ve wronged the mouse, because mice are prey, by nature. Still, better if the mouse never gets in.)
The other, obvious, thing is to look for holes to the outside. With mice, it’s a lot harder than with most animals, but if you *do* find a hole a mouse can get through, it will usually (eventually) become a hole something less pleasant can get through.
BSR
Oh, that’s brilliant! The mice you need to kill are Republirodents! No more qualms or second thoughts!
LongHairedWeirdo
@Ruckus:
Yeah, rats that big are a nuisance. They merit a .25 acp, but most such guns are so small, you have to have the secondary concern of the rat capturing it and turning it back on you!
WaterGirl
@Gin & Tonic: hahahaha
Lepercorn
I had a friend who trapped them and put them in aquariums with litter and hamster wheels and kept them as pets. They looked happy as hell ?
WaterGirl
@LongHairedWeirdo:
Someone told me that, too, so I tried it to get rid of whatever creature it was, and all that did is attract voles to my garden. I do not recommend this! :-)
Duane
@Ruckus: When I was a teenager, friends of mine would go to the MFA mill and shoot rats. Never had any desire to do that. Rats weren’t bothering me.
Grover Gardner
John, don’t fool around! Get rid of them, now! They will get into your stove, your refrigerator housing, everywhere. They nest in the insulation and destroy your appliances. Years ago we had to throw away two perfectly good appliances because everything we cooked or stored smelled like mouse poop.
You can’t use poison because of the pets. Traps work and are quick. I used glue traps and drowned them as soon as I caught them. You need to seal up every gap behind your drawers and cupboards. Heavy-duty glue sealant works. All they need is a quarter-inch gap! Whatever you do, take no quarter because they can be incredibly destructive.
James
You need to check out Mousetrap Monday on YouTube. He has tested hundreds of live traps. Whatever you want to get, just make sure it is one he approves of and use it the way he did. Once you have no more mice inside you need to find out how they got in and fix it. These lil critters can do a lot of damage and spread disease. Do not let this just go.
dimmsdale
City apartment dweller here. I have several varieties of “humane” traps, some of which actually work. (they’re always some sort of plastic box with a drop-down door that the mouse can enter thru but can’t exit through.) I found with a couple of types that you have to train the mouse to go INTO the trap first (by fixing it so Mr. Mouse can get the bait and get comfortable coming and going), or they’re just not interested. (This is useful if you need a hobby and are comfortable with a more distant horizon.) My most effective humane traps ‘did’ for many a mouse, until one ATE through the door. Now, at the first sign of a mouse, I deploy several types and desperately hope that a neighboring apartment has either a Victor spring trap or a snap trap set out. I do have a “Tin Cat”, a galvanized steel box about the size of a small cigar box, that has caught several. (It has a handy plexiglass panel so you can see if you’ve caught anything.) Then, you take the box (or plastic trap if one actually succeeds in catching something) for a nice long walk around the corner, down the street, and release the hostage into a park. Mice are intensely territorial, I’ve read, so the likelihood of the mouse surviving long enough to make it back to your house is pretty slim.
SWMBO
We used a short board and a bucket to catch Houdini (the escape artist hamster). Put a piece of broccoli in the middle of the floor. Do it again the same spot the next night. Yep n the third night, put the broccoli at the bottom of the bucket with the board as a ramp.
When we got a mouse in the kitchen, I picked up a bag of beans and half what was left scattered on the floor. This was a bottom cabinet next to the sink. I left the cabinet door open and my apex predator dachshund dispatched it that night. He viewed the world as people, dogs, and prey. The people were higher in the hierarchy than dogs but he was the top dog. Always. Cats, rats, mice, squirrels, snakes, birds, everything not a dog (and sometimes even a dog) were to be dominated or killed. Every other dog we had bowed to him. I was walking them down by the ballpark and a rat ran across the parking lot. His leash was stretched out just a little more than the other dogs. He got the rat in the middle of its back and snapped it in one quick move. The other dogs were upset that they didn’t get to kill it. Once it was dead, they all lost interest.
ETA. They carry disease that your pets can get. Don’t wait for one to give something to your pets (Lily already has a compromised immune system from cancer). Better safe than heartbroken.
Alison Stokes
@Lord Fartdaddy (Formerly, Mumphrey, Smedley Darlington Mingobat, et al.): call Termix
J R in WV
Pretty late, but I have lots of rats and mice stories from the many years I’ve dealt with them.
Years ago we had a cat, Timidthy, who learned that if he caught a mouse and let it go in the bathtub, it was good for many hours of play more than if he just wounded it. Then one day he meowed to come in, and turned out to have caught a bird, which he let go in the bathtub, and watched puzzled as it flew away!
We used to keep pigs, and under their shelter, a rat lived. When we took the pig to the butcher, after very few days Mr Giant Rat came out from under the pig house. We also had a really big cat, a white and red tom, who killed that rat — it made local possums look small. I found it the next day laying dead between the barn and our house.
Since we moved into the new house we haven’t had much rodent problems. The house is pretty tight, but the other reason we learned when a friend was putting in a new water heater. Up on top of the duct there was a 60 inch long snake skin — neighbor biologist was sure it was a black snake. I have always been inclined to catch black snakes in the woods and let them go around the house and shop, but not inside. I’m pretty sure that snake was why we never saw a rodent in the house. I would rather several snakes in the house than any rodents!
I think that snake abandoned the house for the woods some time back, but we still don’t see many pests, our cats and dogs all are predators, and we find dead rats on the back porch.
Last story. We lived in urban Charleston WV before we found the farm. We lived on the west side hill and wife worked down town. One evening I jogged down town and we ate dinner together. Jogging back home around 10 pm I came upon the prior location of a feed store on the river bank. The ground seemed to be moving! As I got a little closer I could see that it was a massive number of rats — the health department had baited the area after the feed store had moved to a new location. I saw at least thousands of them working on each other.
I turned around and sprinted away, wearing cut offs and sneakers I felt vulnerable. I ran way away to another bridge over the Elk river, where the feed store had been for decades. I try not to keep that memory too close, but there it was. The health department in town is pretty good.
Sis
You’re a sweetheart, John.
Jess
@MattF: that’s the best thing I’ve heard all week
Farrokh Sabeti
No, be kind to animals, you need some chickens in your basement and wash your basement daily. Chickens take care of mouse. Be the essence of cleanliness.
Jenn
I would go on utube and find the video titled : the last mouse trap you will ever need i think you will be able to get rid of the critters after you see the clever idea this man came up with good luck???
Desperate in Texas
@Mikeindublin: not my huge muscle rats. I don’t want to kill them either, but now it me or them. She has eaten the wall and. Floor board of my apt. Apt manager is going to freak out for sure. Got the peanut butter off those huge traps without setting them off. What the heck? I’ve put peppermint and pepper that someone told me about. Nope. Please I can’t afford these. Someone help.
Shawn
Biggie’s problem I have with mice in the house is snakes come after mice and (wild snakes) I can not have.. really any kind of snake in my house is bad lol
Pat
@taumaturgo:
never use poison, inside or out! Had a neighbor that was poisoning Chipmunks, feral cat got ahold of chipmunk and sad sad day watching the poor cat stagger to us and die. Same goes for mice. Any critter can get ahold of a poisoned rodent. Inside or out!
Step
@Lord Fartdaddy (Formerly, Mumphrey, Smedley Darlington Mingobat, et al.): Have y tried dry used teabags that hate them. But it in all the corners of the house and drawers
noname
@Desperate in Texas: Get your landlord or apartment manager to deal with this…that’s what you pay rent for. It is THEIR property that is being damaged.
TerryC
Pretty sure there are squirrel families that have lived in our old 1870 farmhouse since it was built. If they stay in the walls we ignore them. Sometimes I harvest walnuts and that can draw them into our living spaces. They move so fast our cattle dogs don’t even know they are inside.
As you might expect, we also sometimes have snakes, specifically Mississauga rattlers.
Ashley
Mice can not see very well. Because of their eyes on each side of their head. So they use the nose for almost everything. Pure peppermint oil will fix them only AFTER you remove the ones inside your house. Then spray along all the base boards. If that seems a bit to strong of a smell, dilute with water. Non poisonous. Won’t hurt Steve either. If you spray before the mice are out of the house, then they will be stuck inside. But no more will Come in. And they won’t be able to go out.
Veronica
@Supernovabetty: I agree, we had a mice problem for the first time at pur home this winter, and still have the traps under the sink we used, took some trial and error to find the one sensitive enough to actually aey the trap off, first ones we got were these black plastic things and you would hear the mice sitting there eating the peanut butter and no trap going off, they were living in my vents, you don’t want then in your home, there urine and feces carry disease, i have a child i don’t want disease lol, but we found a reset trap that worked amazing it was plastic but looked like the old style wood traps and you just barely tapped it and that thing would go off, so we put em by the vent and ended up catching 6 total and then that was the end of that, also got a cat and trying to train her to be a mouser but hopefully just her presence deters them from coming back, whatever you do do not use glue traps or poison the most humane way to get rid of them is the snap traps, its an instant kill and you don’t have to touch them just release the trap and either flush or dispose of in the trash, good luck
Jc
WaterGirl
@Jc: Your first comment has to be manually approved (which I just did) and after that regular comments go through automatically.
Jaime Cole Durrett
I stumbled across this by accident, which is funny. My dad’s name was John Cole. Anyway, I have a live mouse trap I use from Uline. It works really well. It says you don’t have to bait it, but you do. Just make sure the bait doesn’t prevent the door mechanisms from working.
Me too
@schrodingers_cat: cheese doesn’t ever ever work. Use peanut butter in a trap. Works wonders
Carol G
@Sab: you can unstick with food oil or soft butter. In a Chicago suburban office I unglued a salamander. How it got in the office I don’t know. I put oil on the sticky base so it can’t restck. Then nudged oil under the stuck parts with a pencil eraser end. Once released I put it near the treeline. Mice bite, so be careful. I’ve heard of mice ripping off body parts trying to escape glue traps. Also know of a cat who became terribly ill from catching a poisoned rat. If you release a mouse from a live trap, drive it away from the house. I now have a former feral young cat who was taught by the best and sure is a good mouse hunter.
slightlyevolved
@Sab: You can release them by using oils. There’s some vids on YouTube showing how. You do end up with one very upset, oiled up, and very unhappy mouse though.
Carolyn Bublitz
@LuciaMia: i found a mile away and on the other side of I95 did the trick. I tried snap traps and i cried every time i killed a mouse, and had nightmares.
Josh220
@Sab: There is a way to free them. Olive oil. I had to do it because a room mate’s mom in college bought the horrible things. Get TomCat snap traps and place peanut butter on them. Quick death and reusable.