Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion The Water Cooler What do mice eat ?

Or, more to the point, what *don't* they eat ?

I spent most of my life in solid brick houses (2 layers of brick) with no insulation. Now I live in a wonderful wood-framed house with lots of insulation, out in the woods, so of course in the winter all of God's creatures come in side and live with me.

I figured that they were coming in through the drainage gaps in the masonry facing, eating through the OSB sheathing (yum, glue !!), then burrowing down through the insulation between the OSB and the drywall and holding little mouse orgies in my basement. Drainage gaps are now plugged with steel wool, so presumably they are going to have to find some other way to get in and I can focus on getting the current occupants back out.

I have some live traps out (hint, the old metal "Tin Cat" traps work way better than the new plastic ones) and am running down their numbers (and my peanut butter)... but I find it disturbing that they seem to be eating the wood and insulation for nutrition and, presumably, getting something out of it if only mouse poop.

I understand that mice can get some nutrition out of the glues in OSB and plywood, but they can't digest lumber and fiberglass, can they ? If they can, my only way to limit their food supply would be to burn the house down.

I wonder if you could do some landscaping around the perimeter of your house. Instead of using decorative white rock, you could substitute with moth balls.

There's enough of a breeze that the smell would be tolerable... seriously, do mothballs help to keep rodents away ? I figured they would just eat the mothballs and have another little orgy.

They eat oil filters, for chrissakes.

Many people that have boats (tarp covered), campers, etc., and leave them outside in the winter in Iowa place moth balls inside them to keep mice out. I've heard people talk about this since I was a kid, never tried it, but have heard it works.

Steel Wool around plumbing pipes entering the house works well as well.

I too have used the Moth balls out at the lake in the sheds at my parents cabin. It seems to work(another Mythbuster suggestion?)

I love mythbusters. what a job eh?

Are you a closet Canadian, Eh?

Yup, that is my dream job, not to mention audio equipment reviewer or automotive journalist.

My suggestion is to build a little hut for them a few hundred feet from your house. Keep it warm and filled with food and they won't bother trying to get into your place.

I was seriously thinking about that. I'm probably going to be catching the little ^^^^^^^^darlings through the winter and it would be good to have a place where I can dump them safely.

I'm OK with subsidizing them but the mouse poop has to stop.

Kill them any way you can, I use rat posion I get from the farm service. I also use traps, yes the kind that smashes their darling little heads.

I wonder if 4 EP-600 played at maximum level could be used as a hint to them that it might be time to find some other lodging? This could be an entirely new line of Axiom products: "Joe Smith, Exterminator: Powered by Axiom".

I'm with you Wid.

We too live out in the country and are always fighting a mouse problem. I used live traps until I read an article where they had live trapped mice and then let them go at various distances from the house. It seems that unless you are willing to drive them into the next county, they will find their way back into your house - and they remember how they got in!!

And they really really love cat food. Our cat is useless!!!

Andrea

>>And they really really love cat food. Our cat is useless!!!

Thanks, Andrea. I learned two useful things last night :

1. The real benefit of live trapping seems to be that you can take them just outside the house, release them and watch how they get back in. Plug the hole and repeat.

2. Some people have great luck with cats, others have no luck at all. It seems to depend on whether or not you feed the cat

I find the EP600 idea intriguing.

>>yes the kind that smashes their darling little heads.

Darlings was not the first word I used. I'm trying to keep this family-friendly

I read this and had the following thought:

"OK, kids, let's gather round the computer and read the Axiom forums!"

Well, only a weirdo would read them alone

The baggies of desiccant (sp?) food for them always worked well when I was growing up... they get to rip open a bag (like it's good human food)... it's all nice and grainy on the inside - like a package of grape nuts... and... oh, crap... this stuff is drying me out from the inside... so even if I die inside a wall, I just turn into mouse powder...

I'm a big fan of terminating with extreme prejudice. Send those still-live mice over to live with Richard Gere... or worse (PETA'll be on me for this one)... make then watch a Dane Cook DVD.

Bren R.

When I was going to university five of us were renting a slummy row house just south of Maple Leaf Gardens. The previous owner had moved the kitchen down to the basement.

The house had rodent problems (at parties we would sing "We all live in a mouse infested house..." to the tune of "Yellow Submarine") and every morning we would sit around the kitchen table with an air pistol and take turns shooting the mice as they ran across the shelves at the end of the kitchen. Great fun.

I figure I'll switch to killing traps once it gets too cold for them to learn about burrowing and survival skills out in the wild. The mouse density is too low and I have too little time to shoot 'em.

((Damn preview! I look at it then forget to press [Send]. LOL retyping.....))

I was going to add that you should take care when you clean up the mouse droppings. Some, mostly Deer Mice, can get infected with hantavirus. A nasty respiratory illness that can be fatal to humans but doesn't bother the mice. Figures...

I couldn't remember how to spot a deer mouse from a regular mouse so I Googled and this article tells how to spot the White Bellied & Bug Eyed critters (I see a few scary old men looking like that at the beach in the summer.) Also good tips on how to clean up the droppings without breathing in the dangerous dust. Not sure how big a risk this is in your area but it's a good opportunity to wear a hepa filter, face mask and scare your wife.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/health/hantavirus.html

So no guilt in trapping and killing. Use poison, traps, a good cat, whatever. But you have to keep up the routine or more will move in when the others are gone.

On a lighter note, when I was shingling my old house a few years ago, our cat brought me a mouse every day when I was working outside. Dropped them right at my boots every day between 11:30 and 1:00, just in time for lunch.

Thanks for the link.

Dang, all the mice I'm catching have big ears and bulging eyes. If I have to turn each one over and see if it has a white belly before releasing it, killing them first is looking better and better.

You guys are really grossing out a city slicker like me with this stuff.

As John commented, these are "God's creatures"; but God intended them for our target practice.

>>You guys are really grossing out a city slicker like me with this stuff.

They grow on you. At 21 days per litter, they REALLY grow on you.

If you like I can send you a few free samples. Just send 'em back when you feel you have had enough of "the mouse experience". If they happened to produce a hundred or so other mice during that time, keep them and consider them a bonus.

Interesting fact for the day. Purchased in the same quantities, snap-type mousetraps cost about the same as individual rounds of .44 Magnum ammunition. You can re-use the snap-traps, but you can re-load the brass. On balance, at least for mice, I have to give the nod to traps.

We place a hedgeapple next to the door every fall. No Idea if it works or not, but that's what we do.
I had a mouse problem in my tool box at work a few years back. Like an idiot I kept cookies in the "clean" drawer. The little darlings found out and strapped on the feedbag, every night. When the cookies disappeared they kept on eating, paperwork, pens, even medication. They went medivel on my sinutab- nothing like a congested rodent. I actually resorted to traps in the dam toolbox. When I finally caught one it took off with the trap and died. Couldn't find that stinkin' bastard to save my life, stunk like mad. Finally found the trap and carcass months later several drawers down under the liner.
Anyway, you might try the hedgeapples- conversation piece if nothing else.

Funny but really gross!

What's a hedgeapple?

It's a grapefruit-sized fruit with a gnarled/bumpy skin. Cutting one open and placing it in a bowl in a room supposedly makes a good bug repellent. I haven't heard anything (and apparetly neither has google) about rodent repelling properties.

That's more gross than a mouse. I think I'd rather eat a mouse than that thing.

Before we decided to get a couple indoor and outdoor cats I would lay glue traps down against walls where I thought they were running, never failed to catch them within a couple days. Now once in awhile I'll hear a mouse scampering across the wooden floors upstairs, but they don't seem to stick around so I guess our cat is doing the job. I'm not sure what is worse though, emptying the dang litter box or finding mice trying to struggle out of glue traps.

Twice a year, during late spring and late summer we apply a zinc phosphide bait at the rate of 42# per mile on the sugarcane field ditches ... about 90,000# for each application. I've used this bait, applied to the perimeter of our home with good results.

ZP Rodent Bait

You may want to take a look at some of the non-restricted use rodentcides this place offers John.

This whole thread is making me think of "Mousehunt."

I'll look for the DVD. Maybe there are some good tips to be had

Latest update -- I went away for a week so didn't have traps down, and the rodentia made a successful probe into the pantry. Still not sure how they're getting in there.

I saw a lot of mouse poop in one spot but couldn't figure out what they had been eating. Finally I found an empty bag on the floor which had once held a pound of brown rice.

Shucks... if they were eating brown rice the poor little guys must have been *really* hungry. Even drywall tastes better than brown rice. Anyways, traps are out again; maybe I can thin down the population before the next litter pops out.

I am starting to suspect that the main colony is living on the ceiling of my gun vault. I'm looking at the drawings to see if I could fire a few 12-gauge rounds of birdshot in there without damaging anything important.

Possibly your ears?

Now THAT was funny.

Mark, you've got a beautiful mind.

Bren R.

I just read back through the thread - can't believe I didn't already tell you about the perfect mousetrap! (at least, perfect for easily-grossed-out-me).

Take:
1 bucket
1 coat hanger
A little duct tape
1 pop can (soda can if you're making it south of the 49th parallel)
1 tablespoon peanut butter
water

Fill aforementioned bucket about 3/4 full. Drink cold beverage from can, and puncture a hole in the middle of the bottom. Thread the can on the straightened-out coat hanger and afix the hanger firmly to the bucket. Smear peanut butter on the can.

This whole process takes as long to type as to achieve.

Now mousey runs out to get the peanut butter, the can spins wildly, and mousey drops into water. To remove carcass, just pitch the water.

During the last bad mouse year, the local resort was catching 4 or 5 in a bucket every night.

Is that what you guys are always grilling on the dock?

Add some Chipotle seasoning....oh, wait...wrong thread.

Marty:____Hey Melvin Look! Molly and Marky Mouse are both laying in the water and I don't think they are moving...

Melvin:___Do you think it had anything to do with that peanut butter?

Marty:____Oh my God!! Peanut butter! Let's Go!!!

[A loud splash is heard. Water splashes up from bucket.]

Melvin:___Marty? Marty? Are you OK Buddy? __[pause]__ You can't get out? __[pause]__ OK, hold on! I'll throw you down some peanut butter while I go get you some help.

[Lights down. Pause Splash is heard]

A few years ago, we discovered for the first time that we had a mouse visitor.

Knowing that a few family members were completely phobic about mice, I sent them the following e-mail:

~~~~~~~~~
Hey guys:
Well, we definitely have a mouse problem, as I've found evidence in the food pantry. In the interest of knowing what I'm up against and in finding a creative way to justify the "nightvision" capabilities of one of my camcorders, I decided to keep a camera running when we left the house for a couple of hours last night.

Well, it worked...maybe a little too well.

It wasn't a single mouse getting in there, but a whole family. Well, I assume it was a family as there were two that I assume to be adults and a much smaller one that I assume to be a baby. Unfortunately, with that perspective, I'm unsure that I have the heart to kill them; I might just try to capture them and release them a few miles away.

I grabbed a still frame from the video and am attaching it to this e-mail.

Even for those of you that hate mice, could you really kill a little family?
~~~~~~~~~


























The photo I attached?

Yeah, that MX700 species can be really hard to deal with.

You sure you're not a geek?

>>Now mousey runs out to get the peanut butter, the can spins wildly, and mousey drops into water.

I dunno. That sounds too much like how I broke my wrist one summer. There was a rock in the water.

>>To remove carcass, just pitch the water.

I read about a similar idea using a paper towel tube balanced on the counter edge but that had to be reloaded for each mouse. This seems like a great idea - not only multiple mice per reload but potentially it could cut way down on my peanut butter budget.

Thanks !!

Amie, I'm shocked that you would use such a fiendish device. Consider the .44 Magnum that John B. mentioned previously for possible use on those mice.

Mark, thanks for making my day today. Great posts.

Amen to that. I didn't want to quote that obscenely large text or I would have replied earlier.

Hmmm . . . this summer I did discover I'm a crack shot with a .22 . . .

I'll remind Jack not to make any more comments about (your??) legs...

You shot someone in the Plumber's Bum?

Bren R.

That's disturbingly funny. Liked it.

Not worried. I'm outa .22 range.

The question is, is Bren?

Well, I wasn't out of burr range this weekend... had the hooky part of one blow into my eye and lodge itself under my eyelid... trip to a country hospital where they couldn't find it, then a trip into the city where they did find it (after having to drive with my right eye shut) left me with some superficial scratches on my cornea... so I'm down an eye for a few days.

Driving in the province's first real snow with one eye shut on the highway (who needs depth perception) is a real treat.

They wouldn't give me an eye patch... I may have to go and get one just to look awesome.

Bren R.

Ya but you would be in serious danger of looking like you were trying to Escape From New York....

Holy #$@^%$#!!

Now that the weather is colder I am putting down more "kill" traps, but I figured I would keep the live traps going and try out the recommendation about releasing mice near the house and watching how they get back in.

Small mouse, relatively young. I open the back door, walk to the end of the porch, slide the lid open and let it jump out into the grass.

FIVE SECONDS LATER it was back in the house again. Scampered up the wall to a small gap between the trim and the foundation, and disappeared into the wall. A bigger question is "why can it get into the wall ?" but I imagine there was some chewing by a previous generation of mice involved.

Anyways, I've never seen anything like it. The darned thing made a beeline for the hole like it was on a string. Needless to say there is a lot of steel wool in the gap now. Wish I had filmed it though... even Snake Pliskin would have been impressed.

So, what about the mouse in the wall?

OK refresh my memory, Snake was from Escape from New York(classic 'B' movie) and the sequeal Escape from L.A. How does the mouse bee lining to the hole relate.

>>So, what about the mouse in the wall?

I think it is now the mouse in the trap.

Bridgeman is killing mice. Bren nearly shot his eyeball off and a mouse ran through a hole.

What is there to not get?

My brother had an impressive G.I. Joe collection when we were young. That's Major Bludd, right?

I opened the hood on my truck a couple of days ago and was somewhat surprised to see that mice eat this stuff ... the dirt looking stuff is something the mouse left as a present. First thing that hit my mind was this thread.


I had already cleaned the droppings and the battery post boot crumbs prior to the picture, I was amused.

My Mazda is equipped with an automated mouse extinguisher .

funny, of all places to come across a mouse thread. I hope the $@#$@ers stay out of my Mazdaspeed 6.

We bought a new house in July. Next to a nice sounding brook....yeah well, mice love brooks and the nearby woods so you guessed it.

I've been home with a bad back for weeks now....just me and some mice. It's amazing how the little buggers get in.

Wow... those look a lot younger than anything I have caught so far. I wonder if their parents knew they were out chewing on your automative wiring ?

>>I've been home with a bad back for weeks now....just me and some mice.

This calls for a hard-backed chair, an air pistol and a good book. It's a great way to spend an afternoon :

flip.... flip... flip... BLAM... flip... flip... flip...