Soon after we moved into our new townhome in October, we started noticing our couch cushions starting to fray. At first we blamed the dog, but my wife saw the first mouse. I caught a glimpse of one soon after, and when we found holes gnawed in the dogfood bag, and clusters of mouse poo on the couch, the war was on.
I’ve bought some mousetraps (standard “Victor” snap traps), and caught two with peanut butter bait. (They were very small, maybe 3/4"x2" without tail). But then for weeks, nothing. I thought we might have scared them off, but then we found more poo, and more shredded cushions. For some reason, they were avoiding the traps.
So I switched the bait for nesting materials (cotton balls and embroidery floss, scented with vanilla extract), and still nothing. I tried adding a few more traps with gummi bear bait. Nothing. Not even stolen bait or sprung traps. But we’re still finding poo.
I can’t use poison because I have a toddler and a dog in the house and I don’t know where the mice will take it. We’ve seen them run under the closet door, but putting traps right outside the door hasn’t worked either. HELP!
Others will disagree with me, but I have recently had a lot of success with glue traps placed in areas where you assume the mouse traffic is. For months the mice evaded my traditional traps, but they get caught in the glue ones.
Here’s the thing, they are borderline cruel. Which means you must place them in an area where you will notice on a daily basis, and you must have the stomach to put the trapped mice out of their misery. I do both. These traps have worked out well for me, but whenever I hear a squeak, or find one caught it means I must go through with the final act.
I think his directions make it way more complicated than it really is. Bottom line: cut a soda bottle in two, invert top into bottom, poke some holes in the sides, wire together through the holes and secure onto a board so it doesn’t tip over when a mouse falls in. Use cooking spray to lube up the top so the mouse slides down the ramp, and don’t forget to lube the spout of the bottle so it can’t grab it to climb back out. Toss in some cereal and peanut butter for bait.
I had mice in my old apartment and I brought on MOUSE WARFARE! Here’s what I did:
Pull all the furniture away from the walls and look for cracks where the mice could get in. Often these exist around vents, pipes, under cabinets, where wires go into the wall, etc. Don’t forget to look under the fridge, sink, behind the toilet, and inside any built in cupboard! Mice only need about 1/4 inch of space to get in. If you have tiny mice, they might need even less.
Any little hole you find must be filled. I used varying methods for this - a combination of drywall repair compound, caulking, bits of steel wool stuffed in the hole, and pieces of wood screwed over the hole.
Remove ANY source of food for the mice. Dog food should go in a big rubbermaid bin or similar, same with anything else in a bag or cardboard box - cereal, flour, sugar, etc. Pull out the fridge and stove and sweep or dustbuster behind them. I imagine it’s tricky with a small kid, but try to keep crumbs off the floor. A single kibble of dogfood is like a huge feast for a mouse!
That’s it. This worked like a charm for me - I wasn’t comfortable with using traps. Like you, I had them living in my couch, which grossed me right out. I took the couch apart and vaccuumed it out during mouse warfare, and they never did come back.
I haven’t tried it but I’ve been told that instant mashed potato flakes make a good mouse poison. You just put some dry flakes (about two tablespoons) in a plastic sandwich bag and close it up. place where you have seen mice and let them eat it. Best of all, it is non-toxic to kids and dogs.
You can also get child-resistant mouse bait stations and put them somewhere the child and dog won’t be able to get at, like a secured cabinet under the sink.
My sister had this same problem… she was remodeling her living room, so stored the sofa out of the way in the basement - right beside a jumbo bag of dog food. Remodeling over, they came to move the sofa back upstairs, and mice sprang out like it was a clowncar at the circus. Seems they’d moved in and multiplied quite a bit, what with the comfy nest right there with all the dog food they could possibly want right beside it.
She tried traps first, then poison. No dice. Unfortunately, the only working solution she found was glue traps. Too squeamish to dispose of the little buggers once they were stuck, she paid her 12-year old son $1 for every mouse he disposed of for her. At the end of 2 weeks, he’d earned $32. :eek:
They threw out the sofa after that, and kept the dog food in a snap-lock plastic bin. My sister still refuses to go in the basement alone.
My bait of preference is pieces of Milky Way bars. I first learned about the Milky Way magic when as a ten-year-old, I sorted and lined up all my Halloween loot very carefully in my cupboard, like a candy counter at the drugstore, with a special shelf of honor for chocolate bars. It was a good haul that year, including the full range – Snickers, Hersheys, Butterfingers, etc. I had six little Milky Way bars and as they were my favorite, I was really looking forward to making them last. We got a mouse in the house, and the little bugger got into my cupboard; he took a few bites, wrapper and all, of each Milky Way, and left everything else alone.
So the next trap Dad set was baited with the remains of a bar, and the bastard was caught within hours.
Oh, man, I wish I *had *done that!
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