"YMC" wrote in message
...
Rats! Sometime back I saw that there were mice in my compost bin. I don't
put food scraps there except vegetables - but it must be nice and warm
inside during Winter time.

One of them got into the house. I was watching the History channel
yesterday
when I heard something rattling away at the toaster. I paid no attention
to
it. When I went to make some toast - out popped a small little mouse.

It ran into a small hole inside a cupboard wall. (Meaning its not in the
cupboard but somewhere in its interior gaps.)

I got one of the old fashion traps and one of the new modern plastic
eco-friendly ones which doesn't kill the animal.

how is not killing a european house mouse "ecofriendly"? i know they're cute
but they don't belong here so there's no eco-problem in killing them! (quite
the reverse).

the "humane" traps are good for relocating them. e.g. if you caught an
indigenous mouse, or you caught a european mouse & are hopelessly
soft-hearted. :-)

I thought of borrowing my friend's cat for the weekend. Its quite good at
catching mice apparently. But I don't know how
effective that would be.

Would it help?? I know its an odd question to ask.

i suspect that the cat would spend a few days freaking out, wondering why
it's gone to live at your house instead. by which time you could have caught
the mouse yourself. it would depend on the cat's personality though.

i prefer old-fashioned snap traps. (baited with peanut butter). however,
during our recent & in fact current mouse plague we have had more luck
thusly: bait humane trap with peanut butter. catch mouse (2-3 a day for a
while there). take trap out to yard & release mouse, mouse is instantly
caught & killed by dog. i think they like the humane traps because they
develop a smell of live mouse about them which makes the mouse more likely
to go in - whereas snap traps (i suspect) keep the dead-mouse-smell that
only another mouse would be sensitive to. just my suspicion though. and
also, unless you do something along the lines of the above, releasing exotic
mice back into freedom isn't a responsible idea.

snap traps are good but sometimes you get a malfunctional one which isn't
sensitive enough, & that's where they can be a big waste of time. (not that
getting more is expensive nor much trouble).

At the moment its just one. I hope. Occasionally I leave the doors open
when
I do my cooking - must have got in that way.

mice can get in anywhere their heads (which are very little) can fit. you
can't really mouse proof a house entirely in that way. and as soon as you've
got one, you'll get plenty more.

now we have the mice at our house down to nearly zero, the rats are moving
in instead. sigh! ime, rats are MUCH more clever than mice. it is most
exasperating.
kylie