Kitchen Garden Forum

Geoff wrote:Mind they chew up paper and plastic as nesting material so they might have found food by chance.

I can vouch for that: when my OH was dry stone walling, he often found mouse nests comprising chewed up crisp packets in the walls, presumably having been dropped by hikers or, as is their habit, the hikers having stuffed them into wall. The mice then made a meal of the bits of crisps (and the salt?) and used the shredded packets as nesting material!

They will use anything, we had them in an outbuilding and they had used the very itchy insulation.

A second crop have emerged, I think a different species, smaller and darker with more prominent ears, three trapped in last two days.

Hi Peter,
Your mice will be after your food - I have had the same problem, with them going after dog food again. There seems to be something in dog food they like - but at least it isn't a rat... they are a much more horrible issue!

I got rid of my mouse by keeping all the food off the floor, and putting the dry dog food into a number of air tight storage containers, then putting these in old biscuit tins - not even a mouse can nibble through that! Making sure that the food isn't accessible to them is the first step, as this is why they are making their home with you. Cold and wet weather will usually drive them in, but they tend to go anywhere there is a food source and aren't really that fussy!

I also got myself a sonic repellent, and found it was really useful. I bought one from here: http://www.victorpest.co.uk/shop/mouse-control/mouse-repellents and its been well worth the money.

Mice can squeeze through a gap of about 1/4", they can sort of flatten the bones out to do it. They can also run up vertical surfaces if a little rough. They can't however escape a hungry spaniel in a coalhole! She came out licking her lips...

We tried one of the sonic repeller thingies in our loft space but didn't seem to work. Ended up having to make sure all gaps to the outside world were sealed up really tight with wooden strips and that squirty filler you can get. No food in our loft but we have a thatch and that can get expensive as nesting material.

MW

VictorP

I find a juicy piece of spam on a cheap mousetrap is cheaper than the devices you're trying to sell