We've Got Mice-Help!!! (merged threads)

kayjay1809

humphriess wrote: »

Hi All,
We discovered we have mice about two weeks ago. Not seen anything but there was small tears in our food recycling bag (the council provided food recycling bin is plastic with loads of holes in it). Wasn't sure if it had just got ripped at first but happened a few days running. Then we found droppings in the cleaning cupboard under the sink. We have put traps down but they haven't worked. Tried peanut butter, chocolate (green and Blacks) and courgette (thats what they ate out of the bin). Thought we'd try a sweeter chocolate so now have mars bars in two traps and tuna (my OH read this somewhere) in the other two. why can't we catch them though? We've moved or changed the food every two/three days is this affecting the traps? There is never any droppings on the floor and loads of possible places they could get in (very old house). Last night i put flour on the floor around the room to try and work out the best places to put the traps. But when i woke up this morning, there seems to be hundreds of footprints in all directions in the four. i am now paranoid that we have loads of mice living in our kitchen that are two clever for traps. Any advice anyone please? Keep dreaming they are crawling across my face. And don't like eating food at home or cooking at the moment.
Can't get a cat as OH is very allergic to them. Please help.

First of all get some poison and put it in dark places, including your cleaning cupboard and check daily to see if it's being taken. Then get your traps, one or two in every room, put chocolate spread on them, and leave it until it trips. It is horrible, I know as I said above we were infested badly, but we did get rid eventually. You need to check around the outside of your house to see where they are getting in. The pest control lady told me that if a biro fits in a hole, a mouse can. So block up every hole and crack outside the house, look up and down, as mice climb walls to get in. If you can figure out where in your house they are getting in, you can put the traps there. I found a mouse hole behind a cupboard, so I started putting traps there and they kept snapping every ten minutes or so. It was horrible but I caught loads. Traps plus poison, plus finding all the possible entry points is the only way to get rid of them. Move your furniture out, we found a series of holes behind my son's bed, accessing from the eaves. Good luck, I hate mice too, and can still see them in my mind's eye running around my house!

ps regarding smell, I've only smelt a faint whiff once when I think a mouse was decomposing, but it went in a day, so don't let that put you off. Chances are they are living outside your house and coming in to feed.

luxor4t

Oh goodness, I saw one last night - my first in 28 years of housekeeping!

Operation Eviction starts today: & if DH 'forgets' the traps he can sit up all night holding a brick...I am not joking!


Edit: he came home with a humane trap, one of the sonic wave thingies & some weedkiller: I think the weedkiller is meant for the path, not the mouse!

sb44

I was only talking to a fellow dog walker this morning who has had mice for a while now but has just got rid of them.

She had spent £100+ on an exterminator which didn't do the trick.

Now she has tried mouse traps baited with tuna which seems to have done the trick and she also bought some of those sonic things.

It seems the mice have moved out into her neigbhours house and they are not impressed.

ljonski

a few years ago i put some poison down and within a shorttime problem solved.. Next problem was he died on the burner at the back of the oven and for the next week we were eating smoked mouse pizzas !

The_Thrilla

We were living in a flat that had mice. We tried traps, but the clever little !!!!!!s could get the bacon rind off without springing the trap! Then someone gave us a kitten. The kitten immediately located the mousehole and spent the first few nights lying/sleeping outside it, until the mice moved out.

We once lived in Lancashire, and we were told before we moved in by the previous residents that the place had beetles. Neither my wife nor I came from Lancashire, so we found out the hard way that what they called beetles, we called cockroaches. Now they really are a problem! It is true what they say: there is never only one cockroach. How did we deal with the roaches? We took a tip from the mice: my wife and I (and the cat) moved out.

pollyskettle

I have a sonic thingy plugged in in the kitchen, peppermint tea bags tossed behind all the furniture in the sitting room and at the back of the larder and humane traps (because I won't empty the others and OH can drop them in another county whilst at work) loaded with mars bar pieces behind the furniture..... oh, and a westie but she's been here a while and is pretty stupid as animals go.

Can't tell you whether it's the tea bags or the sonic thingy that works as I put them all out the day after I found the first mouse, but I haven't seen one since (I do, however, believe that it's the minty teabags as I keep forgetting to switch the sonic thingy on during the day).

silverjay

It's the peppermint teabags. Had a few mice a couple of years ago. Strangely enough on the two occasions mice have moved in we've had cats living in the adjoining properties. Tried traps and poison, couldn't catch the things. Read somewhere that they hated the smell of mint so bought a bottle of peppermint essential oil used it in water to mop the kitchen floor and wipe out cupboards. Then soaked some cotton wool balls in peppermint oil and put them in all cupboards and behind appliances. Not seen a mouse in here since. Still use it once in a while just in case.

shebrett

I agree, it's the peppermint that does it. Mice and rats hate the smell of it. We live in a small flat in London and tried EVERYTHING to get rid of a family of mice, the landlord even sent in a company who put very upmarket looking traps everywhere but no luck.

I read about the mint hating thing and bought some peppermint oil online for around £5 and put it on cotton wool balls in the 3 locations we found the most droppings.....we have never seen a mouse since, this was about 9 months ago. I put new ones down whenever I remember (maybe once every couple of months).

.......having said that, I do live in London, it's just a matter of making the neighbours house more attractive to them

INT1

OMG-We had a mouse in our bedroom last night, It took me a few hours to get it out of our room, they are sooo quick and can also jump!

So, from reading this thread, Peanut butter, Mars bars and Tuna they like to eat?

I will buy whatever traps there are, humane or non humane, just want him gone.

I hope he hasn't bought any friends with him!

luxor4t

Update:
- humane trap: total waste of money! keeps shutting itself without anything being near it. Spooky!

- poison trays: these annoyed the mouse so it chucked the poison pellets all over the worktop

- metal trap: mouse managed to eat most of the chocolate, spring the trap & not get caught

- sonic device: jury is still out, but since I heard that spiders don't like them, I keep it on anyway!

The mouse has disappeared & there is no further evidence of any more, but I think this is because we went on holiday for 16 nights & left nothing edible about anywhere. Shall buy peppermint teabags as extra insurance!