Last month I found a dead mouse in my living room. Right there in the middle of the floor, near the door. He looked like he had been on his way somewhere and then just flopped.
Then a few days later I found another dead mouse in the living room. Same deal. Gross but I didn’t think too much about it - better than a live mouse, I guess.
(I assume that the neighbours below me have put out poison, I know I haven’t. They are crawling up beside the radiator.)
Today I went in and found a mouse curled up in the middle of the floor. I reached for my mouse disposal tools but imagine my horror when the thing MOVED. It got up, staggered around, and took a seat elsewhere.
I quickly shut the door before my 70 lb pit bull terrier figured out what was going on.
When I checked again it was gone. Heaven knows where. Fortunately, up until this point they have had the consideration to die in plain view where they are easily disposed of, rather than hidden away somewhere where they will rot and stink. Up until this point, that is, hopefully the dog hasn’t scared them all back into the walls.
Although in the end it wasn’t as bad as the time (at a different house) I was awakened by a SNAP and a scurrying sound, I got up to investigate and the poor thing had the mousetrap around its waist, spine broken but front legs working fine, trapped between the desk and the wall by the mousetrap.
Ugh. This is all so gross. I wish I wasn’t allergic to cats.
I had to deal with a mouse problem once. I found it terribly upsetting–they are vermin, they pave the way for bigger problems, and they have to be gotten rid of.
On the other hand, they’re little and furry and awfully cute.
I set out traps, and when the mice got into the traps (god, what a squeal!) I called a male friend and made him deal with it. I never even looked.
Not that all that has any bearing on what you’re going through… but maybe barricade that opening around the radiator?
Just FYI–and maybe TMI–cats who kill mice can result in grosser stuff than a mouse just dying on your floor.
My dad once stepped on a half-eaten mouse with his bare foot, and then had to clean up the dead mouse, and the vomit from where the cat had thrown up after eating part of the mouse. Not a good way to start the day.
Much better to use a mechanical mouse trap, than a feline mouse trap.
Nothing much more you can do except keep up the supplies of peanut butter and mouse traps. Mouse plague – I feel for you, cowgirl. Including the half-dead-but-still-fighting-the-trap ones. I’ve seen 'em wriggle away and move even after disposal in the rubbish wheelie bin. Uck.
I was anticipating a particularly heinous mess if the DOG - big, strong, clumsy, unproven hunting skills, but with a very high prey drive - saw the mouse first. Destroyed living room, half-eaten mouse, puked-up mouse, choking dog … shudder.
I do need to plug up the hole by the radiator, but I’m lazy and I can’t seem to find steel wool anywhere any more. My own fault, really. What else can I plug it with?
My first mouse experience was in a house where I had three roommates, two female and one male. One female was of the shriek-and-hike-up-skirts-and-jump-on-a-chair-after-seeing-a-mouse type; the other female was never around; and the male felt that just because he was a guy didn’t mean HE should always have to change the mousetraps, so he refused to ever do it, on principle. :rolleyes: So it always fell to me (even though I was the one who was least bothered by the mice).
So there I was one night, reading The Plague and eating my dinner, and I heard the telltale snap. A horrible evening all around.
I never finished The Plague. Or the dinner, for that matter.
