"Drakanthus" wrote in message
news
My mouse traps are catching mice nearly every day under the garden shed. I
keep disposing of the corpses and re-baiting the traps with cheese. But it
occurred to me today - why? Are mice really a problem (outside)? I've
heard
they can carry disease and eat certain garden veg such as beetroot - but
do
they actually do any other damage or harm outside? What diseases are they
supposed to carry and how would they be transmitted to humans? Since
buying
the traps a few months ago I must have killed at least 50 mice. It's
getting
a bit tedious disposing of the corpses each day and I'm wondering if I'm
actually achieving anything anyway. Advice welcome.

I don't mind mice except that when they've been in the pantry I've felt a
little perturbed - don't know why though. Their droppings are easy to see
and clean up. It's impossible to get rid of them completely, permanently.

It's also impossible to get rid of rats but we've just spent three days
trying to make the garden shed invincible to their attention. The trouble is
that rats are far more intelligent than mice and while you can catch a
couple in a conventional trap and perhaps another couple in an
unconventional one, they learn to avoid them.

You're never more than a few yards from rats. Yes, some carry disease but
it's highly unlikely that the diseases will be transmitted to humans. The
problem - our problem - is neighbours who you can't convince of that.

We're surrounded by what we call pests - we tolerate squirrels but not rats,
collar doves but not rock doves (pigeons), blackbirds but not starlings, if
you're read as far as this you'll get my point. I don't really mind, as long
as they leave my food alone. I don't warm to slugs and aphids and cabbage
white caterpillars - to say nothing of gooseberry sawfly (OK I know they
don't eat the fruit) and codling moth are all worse than rodents in my
opinion.

Mary
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