The landlord came and put up some poison a week ago, but the SO is woken up at three (ish) every morning with the pitter-patter of tiny feet and so I’d like to get rid of them quick.
To note - getting into the attic means moving a double bed and most of the furniture in the bedroom so I don’t REALLY want to be checking traps every day…
Secondly, my mother puts garlic husks on her flower-beds to rid them of slugs and snails. It works well, is there anything like that for mice - excluding putting a cat up there?? (or anything that smells of cat either)
Does your landlord prohibit pets? Are you allergic to cats?
Seriously, your aversion to cats puts you in a quandry. However, you could always buy a dog. Dogs are predatory carnivores (or is carnivorous predators?), too. I’m to understand that miniature schnauzers were bred for hunting mice and rats. GrandmaHomie got one and never had another mouse again as long as the dog lived.
There’s a no pets clause, and SO sneezes if she’s around cats for a while. No dogs allowed in the attic, or rats - although I expect the tennancy agreement only specifies pets IN the flat…
I had some success with regular mousetraps loaded with peanut butter. I bagged a few. We got two kittens after that and they were far more effective. (Sorry!)
I once had mice nibbling on my bar of Dove soap so I (naturally) baited the traps with Dove soap and it worked fine. Got them all. You can set a bunch of them and check them weekly. No need to go up daily. Mice just sort of dry up.
Make sure they have no sources of food and water. Finding out how they’re getting in and out and blocking it is your best chance for getting rid of them permanently. If the poison isn’t working, it may not have been left along their regular migration routes (they like to stay near walls).
The landlord said he couldn’t see any way in, but I doubt he was looking very hard. They’re probably coming through from next doors’ attic since there’s no-one there at the moment.
Would covering the poison with chocolate or something make them eat it quicker?
Here’s what I did that worked great. I had mice running the 440 every night in my house’s attic. I put traps up and got some but could never get them all. I called an exterminator and the guy said he’d be glad to come over and get rid of them but I could do it myself just a easy. He said to throw some chocalate Flavored ExLax up in the attic and that’d do the trick. I said I didn’t want them to die up there and then have an odor problem. He said not to worry. They eat the Exlax, the become very dehydrated and go out to get water. Then they die.
Anyway… I did it and within a week or so they were gone for good. Threw some additional Exlax up there just in case of future mice. Never had a problem again.
the old-fashioned snap mousetraps work great. Just load them up with something smelly. You can throw the traps out when you’ve caught something. There’s a reason for the saying, "Build a better mousetrap … "