what’s a house without a mouse?
Here’s a sure sign that seasons have changed: the mice have moved indoors. Our weekend in Catskill was partly spent cleaning mouse poo out of cupboards. Gross! Somehow a bit of baker’s chocolate wrapped in foil got stashed under the sink, and there was one lucky, fat mouse going to town on it for a couple of weeks. We caught him in an old fashioned trap and a dab of peanut butter. Poor little guy. At least he was living well until the end. The folks at D-Con sent over some Bait Paste pouches to try, but I’m not sure how I feel about poison. Even if it’s tucked away, I have fears about it ending up in the wrong place (i.e. the cat’s mouth). We recently heard a great story on This American Life that featured an interview with the world’s largest manufacturer of wooden mouse traps, and he said that you can’t build a better trap. Does anybody have any good mouse catching techniques? I figure it’s par for the course with owning an house — am I wrong? — Angela M.
November 18th, 2008 at 6:11 am
Oh I soooo feel for you. My mother in law lived at our house last week for teh week because mice took over her house! They got inside during a remodel project and finally they are out! She bout tons of teh stick pads that you can get at home depot or whereever and she said mice travel only against walls so she placed them ALL around the walls inside(against them) and caught all within a few days time! She called my husband to come and stick them in bags bc she could not stomache that. But then she had to have a pest compant come out and seal her house from teh outside really well(a tad pricey-you could maybe do that yourself with good eyes and some of that canned”Great Stuff” foam dealant!). Good luck!!!
November 18th, 2008 at 7:08 am
Cat. But it takes the right cat. So far, both of my black cats have been excellent predetors. Plus they really enjoy the hunt. Mice and bats are no match for a good hunting cat.
November 18th, 2008 at 7:22 am
I have to agree with j!! We don’t even know when something’s gotten into the house until one of our two cats catches it, they’re so fast.
November 18th, 2008 at 7:30 am
We have a cat. An old, city cat who has always been more of a lover than a fighter. We know he smells the mice in the house, and it definitely puts a little extra bounce in his old legs. But, he has yet to catch any! And even if he did, I don’t think he would kill it. I think he’d just bring them to me in bed — which is what he used to when he was a kitten and we had mice. We (just he and I!) lived in a small, ground floor studio in Little Italy. The mice used to literally walk under the front door, until I figured that out and put a stop to it. So it’s been 15 years since he’s even seen one!
November 18th, 2008 at 7:32 am
I recently moved into an apt that came with some furry visitors (yay, NYC.) I bought a ratzapper (off of amazon.com) and it worked great! They’re a little pricey (like $50), but I only needed one for my 3-bedroom apartment. Basically, you bait it and just wait (it comes with some dog food kibble that you shove in the trap, but you can use whatever you want.) The mice go in and get electrocuted. Much more humane than a snap trap, far less gross than a sticky pad, and, unlike with poison, you don’t have to worry about mice dying in your walls and stinking up the place. Once a mouse has been caught, you just tip it over to dump out the critter, re-bait, and wait again. Our first week, we caught 5 mice. 2 in the first night.
About a month back, an apartment on my floor had a fire. Of course, whatever mice were living there headed to the neighboring apartments. I saw two mice, put the trap out, and caught them both the next day. Seriously. The best $50 I ever spent.
November 18th, 2008 at 8:23 am
We went with the sticky glue traps, but that is only because I have a brave and wonderful husband. The glue traps catch mice very well — they can’t wriggle free — but then you have an alive mouse stuck to a glue trap. Which someone has to get very close to in order to dispose of the mouse. And if you aren’t at your country house until Saturday, are you really going to want to roll in and find the mouse that the glue trap caught on Monday? So glue traps: Effective, but gross.
Also, not a good choice if baby is crawling, because for some reason, little ones decide that a good time to stick their hands under the fridge is when you’ve put glue traps there.
But — free tip from my exterminator! — if you can find the hole they’re using as an entrance/exit, plug it with steel wool. I guess they can’t or won’t fight with it to open up the hole again.
November 18th, 2008 at 8:39 am
Why trade mouse poop for mouse corpses AND poop? Killing a mouse doesn’t keep the tens of others from reproducing and continuing the cycle of poop and poison. Mice aren’t smart enough to go back to the nest and say “hey guys, these guys have traps and we could get hurt, I say we move to another house” Plus, one you trap is dead. There are always more mice.
A cat can scare them, but if you don’t feel like employing the natural predator, try steel wool and peppermint spray. They will eat through anything EXCEPT metal… so fill gaps in walls with steel wool-or any piece of metal, but the steel wool is easy to stuff in small places without causing any damage or using other tools. Then spray some peppermint around entrances… if it’s a vacation home, spray it everywhere before you leave for a while. Take large objects away from walls. They move in areas they feel sheltered. You’ll notice poop is usually in corners and baseboards or near furniture.
We have a cabin and have kept the mice out of our living space for years, when the traps, poison and sonar devices of the previous owner clearly had no effect.
November 18th, 2008 at 11:55 am
I dont like the sticky traps because i dont like finding mice alive or ripped in half from trying to get off them. I dont feel safe using poision and i’ve tried live traps and they sat in my kitchen for years empty….i dont have a cat anymore but even when we had an outdoor cat we never had mouse problems i think he caught them before they could get in. A good cat or wooden traps really do work best in my opinion.
November 18th, 2008 at 12:04 pm
I second the Rat Zapper–we had an unfortunate and unwelcome visitor in our apartment last year after some sloppy plumbers left a hole in the wall under a sink.
The best part for me is that the trap is completely enclosed; a red light on top blinks to let you know it’s discharged a shock (and, most likely, killed a rodent). So you can just pick it up and dump it into a trash bag without seeing anything too gruesome. I have some horrible memories of seeing mice in traditional traps when I was a little kid (traumatic enough that I didn’t eat cheese until high school), so this alone was well worth the money.
November 18th, 2008 at 4:01 pm
Last year my golden retriever caught a mouse that had been living with us for a few months. The mouse had successfully diverted all traps and poison.
I found out this summer that mint is an effective repellent for mice. I used this in my garden when they were robbing my tomato plants. I’m trying to prevent an infestation by placing mint tea bags in their usual haunts and keeping mint plants around the entryways.
November 18th, 2008 at 4:33 pm
Don’t use those sticky traps or the regular spring traps!!! I work at a vet and have seen many a cat/dog come in with those stuck to them(or poor cats with feet huuuuge from being stuck in a spring trap for hours). And poison? We have a dog who ate rat poison or mice poison come in at least every week.
Use the traps that zap them and kill them instantly. Otherwise your cat may be affected in a not so nice way.
November 18th, 2008 at 7:50 pm
Seconded with the traps that zap them. Home Depot carries them, no mess, no poison, no wrong animals trapped.
November 20th, 2008 at 5:45 pm
I listened to that broadcast of This American Life.
It was great!
November 21st, 2008 at 5:05 am
Too funny! And same problem, here. Just this morning I found our two cats playing with a very-much-alive-but-bugeyed-scared mouse. He kept hopping and running, and the kitties (of course) kept chasing and batting. I finally caught the mousie in a piece of tupperware, and put him outside. My guess is that he’ll find his way back inside within 10 minutes, and the kitties will have found him again 5 minutes after that…..Ugh.