Humane mouse traps

sheramber

Thre are thousands of the little creatures out there. For every one you kill another will move in. They can climb walls or birrow under fences so you will never keep them out.

When we moved into our current house we had loads of voles in the garden, The dogs took care of them and enjoyed a tasty snack.

Now they live on the other side of the fence and the dog waits patiently amd hopoefully for them to pop through.

We do get field mice in the garage but finding they had eaten the dog biscuits left n the car was too much.

We now have traps set in the garage and find two or three a week in them.

sgun

Ironically my cat has only ever in his 15 year life caught one bird which was ill anyway. I have seen him try and catch a wood mouse which danced around him, bit him then ran away.


My chickens on the other hand are mercenary. No mice in their run. I have had to make it frogs/mice/rat proof to save their lives rather than to stop the chicken feed being spoiled.


Our hen feed is in a plastic bin inside the run and has never been chewed into so I think once the bird food is more secure you won't need to kill any mice.


wellused the mice in your attic will just have been enjoying the shelter and making a nice home up there. I only worry if I get house mice in (as opposed to wood mice) as they will chew up everything including the electrics. I then use snap traps as my cat is useless. Wood mice are fine, they only come inside in autumn to hibernate and don't cause much damage at all.


Hope you get better soon Gers

Horseygirl123

I use humane traps regularly as I have 4 cats who often bring little mice in. When I first started using them I was puzzled as the bait was often gone and the door still open. I realised I hadn't been doing it properly. After baiting the trap you have to then tilt the trap forward. It might help to put the trap on a firm surface - dinner mat or something. Hope this helps.

Kyrae

If you have an electric supply to the outbuilding, the electric mice repellers are worth a try! Would have been suspicious of how well they work, but last year we stayed in an old remote holiday cottage and heard scratching in the walls for a couple of days, then noticed there was a mouse repeller and we had accidently turned it off to charge a phone. Put it back on and no mouse noises for the rest of the week!! Search for 'PestBye Advanced Whole House Rat and Mouse Repeller' about £22 on Amazon at the moment. Worth a try, and kinder than killing them

Jumping_Froggy

Not sure I agree with 'it's kinder to kill them'. Relocation can be stressful for any species, including humans! But you aren't dealing with some delicate little creature here. They are a hardy, adaptable, native species, and as long as where you relocate them to is an environment that is natural for them, the vast majority will survive. In fact, unless you relocate them far away they will probably find their way back. They are tough little critters given the right conditions. That said, they don't survive trapped for long, it's mainly not to do with stress (though that can kill them), it's to do with a very high metabolism. Many small rodent species can only survive for a couple of hours without food.

Over 90% of the ones that I caught in humane traps were trying to vigorously rip the trap to shreds, were very noisy and even whilst we watched them, they went ballistic. So they were obviously stressed, in some cases for hours, but not one keeled over. It's not nice for us to see, but I don't feel killing them because seeing their fight for survival offends our sensibilities, is an answer. They are tough, and watching them being released, it was back to business. I followed several who went straight to eat some flower seeds.

Even if relocating them did come with a risk of non survival, for me personally, I'd rather give them a fighting chance. Their lives are one big fight, they are low on the food chain, and lead wild and highly stressful lives. They want to survive. Our comfy, human sensibilities are ill suited to assessing what they would consider humane and 'kind'. That's just my opinion, and respect others will feel differently.

We had voles and mice in the house when we moved in here. We even had shrews, but I think they came in hunting the voles and mice. Setting the trap at night with many raisins and checking it first thing was a daily chore. We removed around 30+ of the little critters in humane traps, only one was found dead and that was because we left it too long.

But we had to consider what it was that was attracting them. Long grass near the house, shelter, access into the house and exposed food and nesting material is what was attracting them. Until we sorted that out, it was a losing battle. For every one removed, more came back. So we sorted out what was attracting them, which reduced their numbers. Then we noticed shrews in the house as well, who were probably hunting the mice and voles, and now I rarely see them. We also have stoats, kestrels and owls which keeps most rodents under control (recently watched a stand off between a rat and a stoat on my windowsill!). Oh and we noticed mice and voles didn't like the lights left on. It didn't stop them, but if the lights were off, they were far more rampant. As long as they are outside the house, I just accept them as part a diverse garden. I just make sure to mitigate all things that may attract them.

As for them being too lightweight for the trap, we did notice slugs went in the trap and ate everything without setting it off.

Ultimately, you have to be comfortable with your choice.

wellused

Kyrae wrote: »

If you have an electric supply to the outbuilding, the electric mice repellers are worth a try! Would have been suspicious of how well they work, but last year we stayed in an old remote holiday cottage and heard scratching in the walls for a couple of days, then noticed there was a mouse repeller and we had accidently turned it off to charge a phone. Put it back on and no mouse noises for the rest of the week!! Search for 'PestBye Advanced Whole House Rat and Mouse Repeller' about £22 on Amazon at the moment. Worth a try, and kinder than killing them

When I was having mice problems we bought some electric mouse repellers, one evening when I was sitting quietly using the computer I heard mice moving in the loft space, I fetched the repeller from another room and plugged it in, I actually heard the mice vamoose from the area of loft above the room. The repellers do work but mice can become use to them and so either turning them off for a while or moving them around can be a good tactic to use.

teddysmum

You can buy cage type traps which will take tiny creatures, as when I was at college, many years ago, we used them on field trips to sample the local vole population. Bank voles are smaller than mice and one tiny tiny one died from shock. (t was only about 4cm long).


Do you have a local museum with a natural history department or a local wildlife rescue, as they could advise or possibly lend you a trap ?

Davesnave

teddysmum wrote: »

You can buy cage type traps which will take tiny creatures, as when I was at college, many years ago, we used them on field trips to sample the local vole population.

I also used trap and release when I was at college, back in the Dark Ages. The traps we used were called Longworth traps. I see they're now horrendously expensive.....:eek:

http://www.nhbs.com/title/160223/longworth-small-mammal-trap-with-shrew-hole

firefox1956

You do know that mice have an inbuilt homing instinct ??
Rather like homing pigeons..........
Release them live & they will ALWAYS return......
HTH

wellused

Read all about it here http://www.wildlifetrusts.org/species/house-mouse