There's a mouse in my kitchen, and it's mocking me.

[channlluv]

Thanks, Knot. I like not having to look in the box after the fact.

Roxy

[Maxxxie]

I've had many fun times killing mice. My most successful method has been hand-to-paw combat.

If you want to read some of my Tales Of Mickey, feel free to click this link and this link. Be warned: They both contain a significant amount of cursing, and the first post of the first link (there's more than one Tale of Mickey in the first link) contains significant overuse of the C word. I apologise. Try to look past it, if you can. Aside from my hilarious Tales of Mickey, there are some useful suggestions from other members about how to get rid of mice.

Hope this helps.
Max

[Pedal Wench]

If you want to read some of my Tales Of Mickey, feel free to click this link and this link.

Maxxie - that's just hilarious! You must write for a living - you're incredible! What a page-turner!!! Really - if you haven't written a book, you should start. Now!

[channlluv]

Those were pretty funny stories.

And the house next door to me is renovating, but nobody there was hoarding. They just had 8 people living in a house built for 3. (Three licenses drivers, six cars...go figure...and two of them were big, big truck things. They're all gone now.)

Roxy

[Cataboo]

The previous tenant to my apartment in grad school had had a dog and just left out dog food all day.

In the first 2 weeks, I killed 10 mice. And usually would kill one or two a month, so I just left traps set constantly.

You really want the hair trigger old style traps, not those fancy ones with the fake looking cheese.

For the especially devious mice, I'd line up 3-4 traps baited with peanut butter against the wall in the corner... so bait towards wall, mouse could possibly get the peanut butter off the outside one without triggering it, but it couldn't get to the peanut butter on the inner traps without triggering one of them...

all organic food matter or whatever was kept in plastic containers or in the fridge... even if it didn't need to be refrigerated.. dirty dishes if I didn't wash them immediately got shoved in the fridge, too. (that was especially after my landlord gave me 2 species of roaches in a used applicance one summer) So only source of food was the peanut butter traps.

[Selkie]

When we had some mice a couple years ago, we got some electronic traps. Put the bait inside the box and activate it. When the mouse goes inside---ZAP, goes to mouse heaven. The best thing is that there is an indicator light so you know when you got one. Then you can have DH dispose of the body (the traps are reusable and battery powered).

[OakLeaf]

We live in the country, and mice are just a (disgusting) fact of life.

Rule #1 is, while we're not the world's greatest housekeepers, when there's a mouse in the house, it goes into high gear. If I have to leave something out to dry, like your pepper, it goes into a colander with a lid on it. Kitchen gets vacuumed of crumbs after dinner every night. All food containers are kept tightly closed - although in general, a casual intruder won't chew through cardboard or plastic unless we're away from home for a while. They don't have to eat a lot, mostly they've come into the house looking for shelter not food, so if there's anything to eat besides the bait, they'll choose that.

Rule #2 is they have patterns where they like to go. They're not as rigid as ants or deer, but they have patterns. Place traps all over the house, but if you've caught one mouse somewhere, pay most attention to traps in the same area for the next one. Remember again that they're probably looking for shelter, not so much for food, so the kitchen may not be the best place to trap them. At least 90% of the mice I trap are in the basement in front of the dryer. I think they're more likely to investigate a trap when they feel secure generally.

Rule #3 is that they need water. Sponge out the bottom of any sinks that don't drain completely, and place a trap near your dehumidifier drain if you have one.

Rule #4 is if you're a bleeding heart like me, once you trap a live mouse, take it at least a mile and a half from your house or it will come back.


Peanut butter is usually good bait, but it needs to be something they can smell, so I'm guessing non-stabilized PB is probably better. I don't buy the other kind so I don't know for sure. Often they will go for ketchup. Or the cartoon stand-by, a small morsel of the stinkiest cheese you have.

I'd avoid poisoning mice in the house even if I didn't mind killing them, for the simple reason that they will go into the walls to die, and if you've never had this happen, you don't want to experience the odor. You know what road kill smells like after a few days, imagine it in your kitchen. It will linger for 2-3 weeks and return whenever the humidity is high. If you want to use poison, keep it in out-buildings and back alleys (in specifically designed containers so kids and pets can't get in).

Mice Cubes are the traps I've used for years. They used to be available at retail everywhere, but the stores figured out that something this cheap, effective and reusable wasn't making them any profit . If you're handy, it would be easy enough to make one. It's just a polycarbonate box with a door that swings in from a hinge at the top. The door is slightly longer than the opening, so it will only swing in one direction, and once the mouse is in, it can't get out. There are a few air holes in the door so the mice can smell the bait, although I usually smear a tiny bit of PB outside the door. They can't steal bait from this trap - they have to actually go inside to get it. In 10 years we've had one big chunky mouse that figured out how to get out of this trap - by bouncing around so much that it eventually turned the trap upside down and the door could swing in. We put a brick on top of the trap and caught it the next night. <evil g> Other than that, it's impossible to defeat this trap.


Good luck, they can be really frustrating.

ETA: hehehe Maxx

[bmccasland]

Get a cat?