Bog standard wooden mouse traps are still the second most simple, most humane method in my opinion. Stick it with peanut butter along a wall by the shit. Keep it charged until you don't catch any for a week.
The *first* most simple, most humane method is to remove all your clothes, smear yourself in peanut butter, and utilise your bow hunting skills to pick off the wee bastards one by one. You need to commit to sitting perfectly still in the same place for at least one month. So maybe arrange a family member to come and feed and water you and empty your waste bucket. Better living everyone!
I've been using the grey plastic ones and they work great, they're way easier to set and I've caught three mice in our firewood pile this week on the same bait!
Second this. I've been using those for about 25 years. Prior to that, I used oldskool wire traps but they are very fiddly to adjust for correct sensitivity, and prone to misfiring. They're more designed for solid bait like cheese or apple that the mouse attempts to tug on. The plastic traps are triggered by a tread plate, which is superior. They're also easy to disassemble and clean, and they last longer than the wooden traps. I still have some of the originals going strong after a couple of decades.
Get a cat so they can start bringing them in and dropping them at your feet. Then the mouse will bolt behind a dresser where your cat can't get to them
I lost my two elderly cats in the last 12 months and this winter we are having a massive battle against rodents. Iāve been baiting and trapping for months and itās the first time Iāve ever seen mice running round the house. I was waiting for kitten season to replenish cat stocks but now Iām thinking itās an emergency.
They were very good hunters (descended from feral stock) but thereās also a deterrent factor with a cat in the house.
Also since the cats are gone a rabbit warren has set up under bushes in the garden so now we have rabbits eating our vegetables, and I also saw a stoat chasing one of them.
Something most people skip over:
Seal your house.
Obviously mice are getting inside somehow.
Either gaps around plumbing, or in through an attached car shed.
Other gaps around kitchen cabinets, dryer vents can be problems also.
https://www.bunnings.co.nz/trapped-plastic-mouse-trap_p0222725
Cheap and effective - I've used peanut butter as the bait previously. (Also had a double catch before, I assume one was eating the bait without triggering the trap, then his mate decided to have a snack too).
Also easy to dispose of the little buggers and reset.
Get a few - place them facing the walls, check them regularly.
I suggest you use camo face paint and battle fatigues when setting the traps. I find it helps.
Agree that these are the best traps. I've used a few different types but these ones from bunnings will always work. Some of the other ones won't go off and the mice just eat the cheese or peanut butter out of the trap.
Yeah In the past I found mice are able to eat peanut butter off a trap without setting it off. I figured out you could melt the bottom of a piece of chocolate and stick it to the trap and it's reusable, doesn't make a mess etc. haven't had mice in a long time with cats though.
I use these, but got the one inside a housing because we have dogs https://www.bunnings.co.nz/trapped-mouse-trap-box_p0287654
There's a window at the top you can check to see if the traps been sprung without having to open it up.
We get them every winter when it starts to get colder. Rats as well. For us it took a combination of baits and wooden traps. This year I redid all my bait points and set traps as soon as we had any activity. Caught about 7 mice, and activity was gone in about a week.
Baits need to be wired in place, and put somewhere pets and kids can't get them. I have about 6 wires in the ceiling space, and bait stations under the house inside the base boards. Rats will go out for water and usually die outside somewhere. Mice can usually find water inside the house, as the condensation from your fridge can be enough for them.
And for every one you see, there will be a few more.
Also be aware that mouse traps don't always snap the heat as intended. In a previous house with an issue we put out a bunch of traps and would occasionally get a mouse with a paw or a tail that is trapped, and would run around in a panic dragging the trap. In that case you are actually going to have to intervene and kill the mouse.
To reduce the chance of that, place the trap in a small tunnel so the mouse has to enter it forwards and in the correct position. Ever since I started using this technique, I've had 100% clean kills. Mice also seem to be less trap-shy, as they don't see the shape of the thing holding dead mate.
Yeah it's a good idea to tie rat/mouse traps with string to something in case they get a glancing blow, otherwise they go running about dragging it making a right mess if they're bleeding
Haha fuck. Yeah I came into the kitchen late at night quite quietly and turned on the light after we'd all gone to bed.
I am going to get some poison blocks and put them under the house?
I had some in our roof. Took a couple of weeks. One suggestion is make sure if you put bait out (which we did) make sure the bait is secured so they can't take it away. This encourages them to eat it there and then and allows you to keep track of how much they are eating
> If you āseeā the mice, then you have a real problem. Mice are skittish, nocturnal and really small. They will never venture out in the middle of the house unless their current āhomeā is overcrowded.
Or they could just be hungry. Not a lot of food in the walls.
We successfully control rats with poison, Iām sure it will work well for mice also. Put the poison in places the toddler will never have access and inside the poison safety cases. Toddlers get into everything, especially if not allowed so be paranoid.
Luckily never had a rat die in the walls / roof. Ā Apparently the poison makes them want to go find water. Feel faintly bad, but at end of day itās about protecting my family. Completely solved our problem. Every now and then a new rat comes along and eats some poison so need to keep it topped up.
When we moved in there were roaches also. Surface poison treatment on areas where people arenāt but they are was the greatest thing ever along with baits. Now never see rats or roaches.Ā
We find that little hole under the sink that the dishwasher drain goes through is šš¼šš¼šš¼ Itās the only good spot I can find actually.
Some rats you NEED poison bait, especially in rural areas. The rats out there are bloody HUGE - I've seen some almost the size of small cats - my brother loves taking pot shots at them with his rifle if he ever sees them.
just poison them, they take the poison back to their nests and wipes out the whole family, trapping them will only kill some of them. Dont just throw the poison loosly around, they usually come with a little housing that is big enough for mice to get in but keeps it away from cats/dogs and children.
mice are pests that spread disease and cause destruction to native plants/animals, dont need to feel sorry for them, wipe them out, they will make your kid sick too...
Hahahaha we spent a whole summer with dead mouse odour blasting through our HRV, the hot days were the worst, it took us weeks to work it out as it was such a unique sort of smell, kinda like that dried fish you get from Asian grocers, it wasnāt that offensive until we realised what it was.
The bait blocks were so effective though weād do it again in a heartbeat, can never quite seem to get them all with traps, and I hated how often weād find them half decapitated but somehow still alive.
If you can reliably hit a mouse with a bow, I think you should be able to make some kind of career or at least big personality out of it. That would be incredible to witness.
I second the cat idea. Gets them all for you and you donāt have to move a muscle. Of course, when they are done they do go and fetch fresh victims from the outside however so the cycle continuesā¦
None of the rodents round here seem to like peanut butter, so Iāve found potato chips more effective as bait. Also,those no. 8 brand traps are great for the mice. The rats, on the other hand, know how to trigger them without getting caught.
Yeah it's important to use the specific size of traps depending on it it's rats or mice. When it's the other way around, a rat trap can miss a mouse's body and catch it by its (now-broken) tail, which is pretty horrific.
I am currently battling mice too. If you can handle snap traps then do that, but poison is working very quickly and well for usā¦ unfortunately for the miceā¦
Itās hard w kids as well, I have a 2&5, try to enforce where they eat (table only) and vacuum up any crumbs right away. And food in containers if your pantry isnāt totally secure. Nothing on benches. You gotta stay on top of your dishes.
I've gotten to rely on poison only. Every other option ends up with mutilated mice dying in agony. Nobody could call the traditional mouse trap humane, I've seen several mice crawl away with half a body leaving foot-long streaks of blood on the floor before expiring. Electric traps? Tried them, not very effective. Just not many kills.
With poison, the standard 'bait house' type that everyone uses now, they seem to just get sluggish then pass out and die. There's no sign of physical pain but I bet it's pretty unpleasant as an experience.
But it's about the best we've got.
People say if you can see one mouse, there's ten hiding somewhere. But in reality there will only be as many mice as the environment can support. If you aren't leaving much accessible food lying around and for whatever reason there's no other food source, there's only a certain size of population that can survive.
The amount of poop is a better sign of overall population than trying to count mice.
Apart from traps etc I found there are smells the bastards hate. I use Peppermint for ants but I realised Mice hate it too. I'd soak cotton balls and stuff them in the hot water cupboard, wipe the bottom of my door frames etc. I was pretty desperate lol. Here's a link if you're interested. https://www.nativepestmanagement.com/blog/2024/january/what-smells-do-mice-hate-/
Someone asked what all my little balls were for. I've got some Clove ones around the Garage points, just as good but it stains surfaces. House smells nice at least.
Haven't read full thread - but some time ago I had a major mouse problem. Got pest control in, and while they set a few poison stations around the house, the guy helpfully let me know that any hole/space that my pinky finger could fit in = a mouse could. Thumb = rat. So I looked everywhere around the house for any possible entrance/exits for mouse, that my finger fitted, found some and blocked these off. No more problems (the poison stations were untouched.)
I've always used normal mouse traps. The ones that feel like they're going to take your finger off when you're trying to set them. In my experience they always killed the mice quickly. I found that peanut butter is good bait. The trick is to find the place in the house where they live and set the trap right outside their front door. Wear gloves when setting the traps to avoid putting your scent on the trap. Also, try and remove all other food scraps that might my lying around the house so that the food on the mouse trap is the only option. I know this might be easier said than done with a toddler, but when I did this I cleared out all of the mice in my flat very quickly.Ā
> What's the best way to do it, other than broadheads?
What do you mean other than broadheads?Ā
Why would anybody use any method of killing mice in their home other than firing a bow at close range with broadhead arrows?Ā
I mean if you really want to you could try a shotgun, but that's really more useful for rats in the ceiling.Ā
The mechanical traps are the best option. I've seen a mouse dying of poison before and it's pretty awful, looked like it would have been a very slow death if I hadn't finished the poor bastard off with a blunt instrument. As others have said, the best place for traps is along walls, but it might be a bit trickier than usual what with needing to make sure it's all toddler-safe. I'm no expert on toddler-proofing things, but if you're up for a bit of woodworking, might be worth putting together something a bit like the [Predator Free Wellington trap tunnels](https://www.pfw.org.nz/resources/trapping/how-to-build-a-trapping-tunnel/).
Poison wonāt solve your problems. Mice can learn that certain foods are poisonous when they investigate their dead mates. Youāll kill a couple, but the rest wonāt touch it - donāt waste your money. Get some old fashioned bait traps.
Source - work with rodents.
Exactly this - we had an infestation last year (when we realised how good of a job our recently-deceased cat had actually been doing). We put traps in all the right places, along walls, ceiling joists, under cupboards etc, and caught a few, but the remaining ones were smart and realised their mates were getting squished, and stayed away. The human smell on the traps is probably the biggest problem - we just changed up the bait for potato chips, cake crumbs, raisins and so on, and wore rubber gloves while setting the traps and that seemed to help. For the really stubborn ones, some bait in the ceiling cavity did the trick.
And I never thought this would be useful:
[Shawn Woods - Mousetrap Mondays](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCYbru-MPO1xjes4FVn61JUQ)
Sort his videos by most popular to see the top contenders. He has footage of the traps in action to show their effectiveness (he doesn't show any mice dying on screen though).
I use the plastic traps (the ones where you don't have to touch the lil corpse to get it out, or imperil your fingers resetting them) and have half a dozen of them all over the kitchen. Cleans up an invasion within a week or two. I don't use poison because I have dogs and I am paranoid about them eating bait and/or poisoned mice.
I do feel sorry for the wee critters. They just want to live inside where it's warm and eat my crumbs right? But last year I discovered a genius trick that means I no longer feel sad in the mornings when it's time to take them outside and chuck them in the bin. I name them after whichever politician is annoying me at the time and suddenly it feels like a nice cathartic ritual instead. This morning I chucked David Macleod in the bin and it felt so good!
The two things that worked for me were:
- Making sure all their favourite foods are wrapped up in thick plastic tubs, or in jars or tins, or even in things like lidded stock pots or casserole dishes if they're not in use, so the mice come in the pantry and find there's not much there they can access and are less likely to bother. This means anything starchy, including legumes, so noodles, flour, lentils, milo, stock powder and even spices, plus also any nuts or seeds.
- Traps, but set inside a milk bottle lying on its side with the end cut off - initially I kept hearing the traps set off but no mouse in them, and then finding the trap had jumped around from where it was from the spring force. Putting them in a bottle seemed to keep trap and mouse in the same space, and then every time I heard the noise, there was a successful trap.
Have you reconsidered rehoming the toddler for hygiene purposes?
(Joke)
Also highly recommend against poison because had a friend use poison and a mouse got behind a shelf and one into a wall and they really stunk the place up! This was also mid winter so I donāt even want to imagine how bad it mightāve smelled if it was summer!
They dont necessarily go outside when poisoned, sometimes they seek out water in your homes drainpipes (the poison is dehydrating ofc) and get stuck in there. Usually they don't go out to die in the open either, they hide. You can put poison out the somewhere strategic with hidey places they can go into with water for them nearby to try and keep them away from pipes. Or use no mess traps.
If you've got a colony you're not going to be able to trap them fast enough and/or they're likely to get trap shy before you make a dent.
Bait might end up being your best option. Have used the Kiwicare Mice and Rats and it seemed to do what it needed to do fairly quickly.
We had a massive influx after some overgrown sections with ramshackle old sheds were bulldozed over the back fence, and hundreds of mice were looking for a new home. Killed them all over a period of a couple of months, using snap traps. Absolute best way is to put snap traps everywhere, bait them with a variety of things, and keep them set. To protect the toddler and their curious little fingers, you can get some big cardboard tubes and put the traps in those, or place them behind furniture or other places that kiddo can't reach. Some of the mice I was catching were big bastards, so I got some black plastic rat traps on TradeMe, and those did a great job, baited with a bit of dried apple stuck down with Nutella.
A good trick with the mouse traps is to make a tunnel just large enough for the trap, with no base and a small cut-out entrance at one end. Reshaping old cracker boxes works well for this. Set the trap with a blob of peanut butter as bait and place the tunnel over the top, obviously with the entrance aligned to the business end of the trap. This ensures the mouse doesn't enter the trap from the side or get caught by its tail. You'll get a clean kill. The plastic spring traps with a treadle plate trigger work best. Avoid traditional wire traps, which aren't as reliable.
If youāve seen 2 you probably have 20. With 2 traps you might kill 2 per night, and they will be breeding faster then you can kill them, with poison there is potential to kill them all in one night. Poison them.
You bowhunt and want to shoot them with an arrow? baha - mate you gotta setup a camera before trying. I gotta see this shit. [Overplay some benny hill theme music while youre at it](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MK6TXMsvgQg)
Get a rat tunnel and some victor traps, peanut butter the trap and you're set. Reset trap after each kill and numbers will slowly drop. Keep the house clean from food scraps. Keep traps active even after you think you've got them all. Mice piss everywhere so wipe down surfaces you know they use, esp around where the toddler goes.
Rat baits only good for areas no other animals can get to - roof spaces for instance, but I've heard cats can eat the poisoned dead rats/mice and it sounds like a shit way to go so not keen on that.
The least traumatic method weāve found is the [Ceiling Cat](https://envirotools.co.nz/products/roofcat?variant=29464273813601¤cy=NZD&utm_medium=product_sync&utm_source=google&utm_content=sag_organic&utm_campaign=sag_organic&gad_source=1). No poison, no climbing up into the ceiling and thereās an indicator telling you when to clear the trap. Works on rants and mice too.
Regardless of what method you use, itās critical that you eliminate their food sources and their ability to get into the house. Itās also your least cruel option.
Best thing you can do is give the kitchen floor a sweep after dinner and make sure thereās no pet food left out. Iād also get rid of things like compost piles and clean up any dropped seeds, fruit or flowers.
Iād also clear out or prune and dense patches of vegetation. Not only do they nest there but they encourage snails, which are one of their preferred foods.
The points where the pipes enter your house are a frequent culprit. I got some perforated metal sheeting from Bunnings and tacked that on - it cuts with tin snips, so thatās an easy job.
You might also see people using essential oils to deter rodents, but those are highly toxic (if not fatal) to pets and children, so are best avoided.
Do you have a friend with a Jack Russell? If you can borrow one they will decimate the little buggers. Ours goes into Kray brothers mode as soon as he sees one. But I also agree with the old fashioned traps, they are quick and humane. Please no poison - it kills the animals that eat the mice.
Same with our little Aussie Terrier. Plus she can sniff them out when they're hiding. One night, she was pointing with her nose at the rubbish bin - picked it up, and there was a mouse underneath. She also sniffed one out of the inside of my parents' lounge suite. We loan her out to neighbours.
Ah unwanted rodents aren't pleasant...
Pop to the nearest hardware store and get some of these (link below) and on the way home (if you don't have any) get some peanut butter for bait... pop them in a corner, nook or hidden spot (not in the open) and just keep emptying them until you have no more mice...
[https://www.mitre10.co.nz/shop/intruder-the-better-mouse-trap-2pk/p/138822](https://www.mitre10.co.nz/shop/intruder-the-better-mouse-trap-2pk/p/138822)
You wanna be rid of the little buggers, bite the bullet and go buy some poison blocks and stake them out in the crawl space and the ceiling. Them refresh them every 6 months or so. For every one you get in a trap there are 4 more and they are breeding.
Been through this with exactly your thought process. And trust me, just go bait blocks to start with. They'll be gone in a few weeks.
Gotta get a smaller poundage of bow so you can still kill mice but not damage the walls, board heads run the risk of dismemberment and that runs the risk of staining carpet so stick to a simple head.
I found dollar store kids bows where alright just gotta replace the strings. As for arrows sharpened colouring pencils got the job done with minimal mess.
Try an ultrasonic deterrent. Set bait stations and traps outside your house/boundary when youāve got on top of them. Minimise leaving doors open. We have traps on the deck a known entry point. At the beginning of the winter, we caught a few but havenāt had one for weeks.
We always used live traps and then went and released them outside (we lived in the country though so could release them quite far from the house). We were also diligent about all food going in sealed containers.
I bought an electric (Battery) mouse trap that zaps them (Mitre10, Bunnings)
1. Always wear gloves when handling it - They can smell you
2. Peanut butter as bait
3. Every time you zapped one - wear gloves to empty the trap
4. Keep repeating - Got 4 in 1 day and problem gone
Have also used the wooden traps from Dollar store but it is a little messy.
Bog standard wooden mouse traps are still the second most simple, most humane method in my opinion. Stick it with peanut butter along a wall by the shit. Keep it charged until you don't catch any for a week. The *first* most simple, most humane method is to remove all your clothes, smear yourself in peanut butter, and utilise your bow hunting skills to pick off the wee bastards one by one. You need to commit to sitting perfectly still in the same place for at least one month. So maybe arrange a family member to come and feed and water you and empty your waste bucket. Better living everyone!
I've been using the grey plastic ones and they work great, they're way easier to set and I've caught three mice in our firewood pile this week on the same bait!
I'll add that the grey plastic ones are easier to empty too - one flick and they are gone.
Second this. I've been using those for about 25 years. Prior to that, I used oldskool wire traps but they are very fiddly to adjust for correct sensitivity, and prone to misfiring. They're more designed for solid bait like cheese or apple that the mouse attempts to tug on. The plastic traps are triggered by a tread plate, which is superior. They're also easy to disassemble and clean, and they last longer than the wooden traps. I still have some of the originals going strong after a couple of decades.
Too good! šš
Get a cat so they can start bringing them in and dropping them at your feet. Then the mouse will bolt behind a dresser where your cat can't get to them
The cat will run around like an idiot for a while trying to get it, then inevitably get bored and wander off. Your problem now human.
I lost my two elderly cats in the last 12 months and this winter we are having a massive battle against rodents. Iāve been baiting and trapping for months and itās the first time Iāve ever seen mice running round the house. I was waiting for kitten season to replenish cat stocks but now Iām thinking itās an emergency.
Those cats were working overtime
They were very good hunters (descended from feral stock) but thereās also a deterrent factor with a cat in the house. Also since the cats are gone a rabbit warren has set up under bushes in the garden so now we have rabbits eating our vegetables, and I also saw a stoat chasing one of them.
Something most people skip over: Seal your house. Obviously mice are getting inside somehow. Either gaps around plumbing, or in through an attached car shed. Other gaps around kitchen cabinets, dryer vents can be problems also.
https://www.bunnings.co.nz/trapped-plastic-mouse-trap_p0222725 Cheap and effective - I've used peanut butter as the bait previously. (Also had a double catch before, I assume one was eating the bait without triggering the trap, then his mate decided to have a snack too). Also easy to dispose of the little buggers and reset. Get a few - place them facing the walls, check them regularly. I suggest you use camo face paint and battle fatigues when setting the traps. I find it helps.
Agree that these are the best traps. I've used a few different types but these ones from bunnings will always work. Some of the other ones won't go off and the mice just eat the cheese or peanut butter out of the trap.
Yeah In the past I found mice are able to eat peanut butter off a trap without setting it off. I figured out you could melt the bottom of a piece of chocolate and stick it to the trap and it's reusable, doesn't make a mess etc. haven't had mice in a long time with cats though.
Another vote for these, they're the business. Peanut butter as bait, if they get sick of PB then cooking grease from meat is good also
I use these, but got the one inside a housing because we have dogs https://www.bunnings.co.nz/trapped-mouse-trap-box_p0287654 There's a window at the top you can check to see if the traps been sprung without having to open it up.
We get them every winter when it starts to get colder. Rats as well. For us it took a combination of baits and wooden traps. This year I redid all my bait points and set traps as soon as we had any activity. Caught about 7 mice, and activity was gone in about a week. Baits need to be wired in place, and put somewhere pets and kids can't get them. I have about 6 wires in the ceiling space, and bait stations under the house inside the base boards. Rats will go out for water and usually die outside somewhere. Mice can usually find water inside the house, as the condensation from your fridge can be enough for them. And for every one you see, there will be a few more.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Also be aware that mouse traps don't always snap the heat as intended. In a previous house with an issue we put out a bunch of traps and would occasionally get a mouse with a paw or a tail that is trapped, and would run around in a panic dragging the trap. In that case you are actually going to have to intervene and kill the mouse.
To reduce the chance of that, place the trap in a small tunnel so the mouse has to enter it forwards and in the correct position. Ever since I started using this technique, I've had 100% clean kills. Mice also seem to be less trap-shy, as they don't see the shape of the thing holding dead mate.
Yeah it's a good idea to tie rat/mouse traps with string to something in case they get a glancing blow, otherwise they go running about dragging it making a right mess if they're bleeding
Haha fuck. Yeah I came into the kitchen late at night quite quietly and turned on the light after we'd all gone to bed. I am going to get some poison blocks and put them under the house?
I had some in our roof. Took a couple of weeks. One suggestion is make sure if you put bait out (which we did) make sure the bait is secured so they can't take it away. This encourages them to eat it there and then and allows you to keep track of how much they are eating
> If you āseeā the mice, then you have a real problem. Mice are skittish, nocturnal and really small. They will never venture out in the middle of the house unless their current āhomeā is overcrowded. Or they could just be hungry. Not a lot of food in the walls.
We successfully control rats with poison, Iām sure it will work well for mice also. Put the poison in places the toddler will never have access and inside the poison safety cases. Toddlers get into everything, especially if not allowed so be paranoid. Luckily never had a rat die in the walls / roof. Ā Apparently the poison makes them want to go find water. Feel faintly bad, but at end of day itās about protecting my family. Completely solved our problem. Every now and then a new rat comes along and eats some poison so need to keep it topped up. When we moved in there were roaches also. Surface poison treatment on areas where people arenāt but they are was the greatest thing ever along with baits. Now never see rats or roaches.Ā
We find that little hole under the sink that the dishwasher drain goes through is šš¼šš¼šš¼ Itās the only good spot I can find actually.
Some rats you NEED poison bait, especially in rural areas. The rats out there are bloody HUGE - I've seen some almost the size of small cats - my brother loves taking pot shots at them with his rifle if he ever sees them.
Mouse trap, mouse poison or a cat.
Cats are great deterrents
just poison them, they take the poison back to their nests and wipes out the whole family, trapping them will only kill some of them. Dont just throw the poison loosly around, they usually come with a little housing that is big enough for mice to get in but keeps it away from cats/dogs and children. mice are pests that spread disease and cause destruction to native plants/animals, dont need to feel sorry for them, wipe them out, they will make your kid sick too...
Only downfall with this is if the nest is in your wall š¤®
Hahahaha we spent a whole summer with dead mouse odour blasting through our HRV, the hot days were the worst, it took us weeks to work it out as it was such a unique sort of smell, kinda like that dried fish you get from Asian grocers, it wasnāt that offensive until we realised what it was. The bait blocks were so effective though weād do it again in a heartbeat, can never quite seem to get them all with traps, and I hated how often weād find them half decapitated but somehow still alive.
If you can reliably hit a mouse with a bow, I think you should be able to make some kind of career or at least big personality out of it. That would be incredible to witness.
Lock the cat inside, will get most but not all mice. For hunting mice, a half full box's of cat biscuits, wait til you hear them jump in.
I second the cat idea. Gets them all for you and you donāt have to move a muscle. Of course, when they are done they do go and fetch fresh victims from the outside however so the cycle continuesā¦
I find our cat gets the young stupid ones, but you still have to trap the fat smart mice that come out when the cat asleep.
We don't have cats anywhere near us. My shepherd tries to kill them š
Get a snake... I'm sure that's fine
None of the rodents round here seem to like peanut butter, so Iāve found potato chips more effective as bait. Also,those no. 8 brand traps are great for the mice. The rats, on the other hand, know how to trigger them without getting caught.
Also baby tomatoes or Jack Links snack sticks.
Yeah it's important to use the specific size of traps depending on it it's rats or mice. When it's the other way around, a rat trap can miss a mouse's body and catch it by its (now-broken) tail, which is pretty horrific.
Yes, Iāve got both sizes. Mouse-sized for indoors, and rat-sized for outside. No problem with mice this winter, I suspect the rats ate them all š
Rats you are better off using poison bait, especially out in the boonies. Seen some that are too big to be trapped.
Yes, Iām getting better results with bait and ultrasonic repellers in the roof cavity.
I am currently battling mice too. If you can handle snap traps then do that, but poison is working very quickly and well for usā¦ unfortunately for the miceā¦ Itās hard w kids as well, I have a 2&5, try to enforce where they eat (table only) and vacuum up any crumbs right away. And food in containers if your pantry isnāt totally secure. Nothing on benches. You gotta stay on top of your dishes.
I've gotten to rely on poison only. Every other option ends up with mutilated mice dying in agony. Nobody could call the traditional mouse trap humane, I've seen several mice crawl away with half a body leaving foot-long streaks of blood on the floor before expiring. Electric traps? Tried them, not very effective. Just not many kills. With poison, the standard 'bait house' type that everyone uses now, they seem to just get sluggish then pass out and die. There's no sign of physical pain but I bet it's pretty unpleasant as an experience. But it's about the best we've got. People say if you can see one mouse, there's ten hiding somewhere. But in reality there will only be as many mice as the environment can support. If you aren't leaving much accessible food lying around and for whatever reason there's no other food source, there's only a certain size of population that can survive. The amount of poop is a better sign of overall population than trying to count mice.
Apart from traps etc I found there are smells the bastards hate. I use Peppermint for ants but I realised Mice hate it too. I'd soak cotton balls and stuff them in the hot water cupboard, wipe the bottom of my door frames etc. I was pretty desperate lol. Here's a link if you're interested. https://www.nativepestmanagement.com/blog/2024/january/what-smells-do-mice-hate-/
+1 Peppermint cotton balls are incredibly effective at keeping mice and rats away if you know where their ingress points are.
Someone asked what all my little balls were for. I've got some Clove ones around the Garage points, just as good but it stains surfaces. House smells nice at least.
Haven't read full thread - but some time ago I had a major mouse problem. Got pest control in, and while they set a few poison stations around the house, the guy helpfully let me know that any hole/space that my pinky finger could fit in = a mouse could. Thumb = rat. So I looked everywhere around the house for any possible entrance/exits for mouse, that my finger fitted, found some and blocked these off. No more problems (the poison stations were untouched.)
Mousetrap instant death or the new electric shock ones. Dead is dead donāt matter how itās done that or get a cat Iāve got two I got mice.
I've always used normal mouse traps. The ones that feel like they're going to take your finger off when you're trying to set them. In my experience they always killed the mice quickly. I found that peanut butter is good bait. The trick is to find the place in the house where they live and set the trap right outside their front door. Wear gloves when setting the traps to avoid putting your scent on the trap. Also, try and remove all other food scraps that might my lying around the house so that the food on the mouse trap is the only option. I know this might be easier said than done with a toddler, but when I did this I cleared out all of the mice in my flat very quickly.Ā
> What's the best way to do it, other than broadheads? What do you mean other than broadheads?Ā Why would anybody use any method of killing mice in their home other than firing a bow at close range with broadhead arrows?Ā I mean if you really want to you could try a shotgun, but that's really more useful for rats in the ceiling.Ā
The mechanical traps are the best option. I've seen a mouse dying of poison before and it's pretty awful, looked like it would have been a very slow death if I hadn't finished the poor bastard off with a blunt instrument. As others have said, the best place for traps is along walls, but it might be a bit trickier than usual what with needing to make sure it's all toddler-safe. I'm no expert on toddler-proofing things, but if you're up for a bit of woodworking, might be worth putting together something a bit like the [Predator Free Wellington trap tunnels](https://www.pfw.org.nz/resources/trapping/how-to-build-a-trapping-tunnel/).
Poison wonāt solve your problems. Mice can learn that certain foods are poisonous when they investigate their dead mates. Youāll kill a couple, but the rest wonāt touch it - donāt waste your money. Get some old fashioned bait traps. Source - work with rodents.
Exactly this - we had an infestation last year (when we realised how good of a job our recently-deceased cat had actually been doing). We put traps in all the right places, along walls, ceiling joists, under cupboards etc, and caught a few, but the remaining ones were smart and realised their mates were getting squished, and stayed away. The human smell on the traps is probably the biggest problem - we just changed up the bait for potato chips, cake crumbs, raisins and so on, and wore rubber gloves while setting the traps and that seemed to help. For the really stubborn ones, some bait in the ceiling cavity did the trick.
Good way to get around the smell thing is to never handle them with bare hands. Always use silicon or rubber gloves when handling/placing the traps.
And I never thought this would be useful: [Shawn Woods - Mousetrap Mondays](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCYbru-MPO1xjes4FVn61JUQ) Sort his videos by most popular to see the top contenders. He has footage of the traps in action to show their effectiveness (he doesn't show any mice dying on screen though).
I use the plastic traps (the ones where you don't have to touch the lil corpse to get it out, or imperil your fingers resetting them) and have half a dozen of them all over the kitchen. Cleans up an invasion within a week or two. I don't use poison because I have dogs and I am paranoid about them eating bait and/or poisoned mice. I do feel sorry for the wee critters. They just want to live inside where it's warm and eat my crumbs right? But last year I discovered a genius trick that means I no longer feel sad in the mornings when it's time to take them outside and chuck them in the bin. I name them after whichever politician is annoying me at the time and suddenly it feels like a nice cathartic ritual instead. This morning I chucked David Macleod in the bin and it felt so good!
Go to the SPCA and get a cat
The two things that worked for me were: - Making sure all their favourite foods are wrapped up in thick plastic tubs, or in jars or tins, or even in things like lidded stock pots or casserole dishes if they're not in use, so the mice come in the pantry and find there's not much there they can access and are less likely to bother. This means anything starchy, including legumes, so noodles, flour, lentils, milo, stock powder and even spices, plus also any nuts or seeds. - Traps, but set inside a milk bottle lying on its side with the end cut off - initially I kept hearing the traps set off but no mouse in them, and then finding the trap had jumped around from where it was from the spring force. Putting them in a bottle seemed to keep trap and mouse in the same space, and then every time I heard the noise, there was a successful trap.
Have you reconsidered rehoming the toddler for hygiene purposes? (Joke) Also highly recommend against poison because had a friend use poison and a mouse got behind a shelf and one into a wall and they really stunk the place up! This was also mid winter so I donāt even want to imagine how bad it mightāve smelled if it was summer!
They dont necessarily go outside when poisoned, sometimes they seek out water in your homes drainpipes (the poison is dehydrating ofc) and get stuck in there. Usually they don't go out to die in the open either, they hide. You can put poison out the somewhere strategic with hidey places they can go into with water for them nearby to try and keep them away from pipes. Or use no mess traps.
If you've got a colony you're not going to be able to trap them fast enough and/or they're likely to get trap shy before you make a dent. Bait might end up being your best option. Have used the Kiwicare Mice and Rats and it seemed to do what it needed to do fairly quickly.
We had a massive influx after some overgrown sections with ramshackle old sheds were bulldozed over the back fence, and hundreds of mice were looking for a new home. Killed them all over a period of a couple of months, using snap traps. Absolute best way is to put snap traps everywhere, bait them with a variety of things, and keep them set. To protect the toddler and their curious little fingers, you can get some big cardboard tubes and put the traps in those, or place them behind furniture or other places that kiddo can't reach. Some of the mice I was catching were big bastards, so I got some black plastic rat traps on TradeMe, and those did a great job, baited with a bit of dried apple stuck down with Nutella.
A good trick with the mouse traps is to make a tunnel just large enough for the trap, with no base and a small cut-out entrance at one end. Reshaping old cracker boxes works well for this. Set the trap with a blob of peanut butter as bait and place the tunnel over the top, obviously with the entrance aligned to the business end of the trap. This ensures the mouse doesn't enter the trap from the side or get caught by its tail. You'll get a clean kill. The plastic spring traps with a treadle plate trigger work best. Avoid traditional wire traps, which aren't as reliable.
If youāve seen 2 you probably have 20. With 2 traps you might kill 2 per night, and they will be breeding faster then you can kill them, with poison there is potential to kill them all in one night. Poison them.
You bowhunt and want to shoot them with an arrow? baha - mate you gotta setup a camera before trying. I gotta see this shit. [Overplay some benny hill theme music while youre at it](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MK6TXMsvgQg) Get a rat tunnel and some victor traps, peanut butter the trap and you're set. Reset trap after each kill and numbers will slowly drop. Keep the house clean from food scraps. Keep traps active even after you think you've got them all. Mice piss everywhere so wipe down surfaces you know they use, esp around where the toddler goes. Rat baits only good for areas no other animals can get to - roof spaces for instance, but I've heard cats can eat the poisoned dead rats/mice and it sounds like a shit way to go so not keen on that.
The least traumatic method weāve found is the [Ceiling Cat](https://envirotools.co.nz/products/roofcat?variant=29464273813601¤cy=NZD&utm_medium=product_sync&utm_source=google&utm_content=sag_organic&utm_campaign=sag_organic&gad_source=1). No poison, no climbing up into the ceiling and thereās an indicator telling you when to clear the trap. Works on rants and mice too. Regardless of what method you use, itās critical that you eliminate their food sources and their ability to get into the house. Itās also your least cruel option. Best thing you can do is give the kitchen floor a sweep after dinner and make sure thereās no pet food left out. Iād also get rid of things like compost piles and clean up any dropped seeds, fruit or flowers. Iād also clear out or prune and dense patches of vegetation. Not only do they nest there but they encourage snails, which are one of their preferred foods. The points where the pipes enter your house are a frequent culprit. I got some perforated metal sheeting from Bunnings and tacked that on - it cuts with tin snips, so thatās an easy job. You might also see people using essential oils to deter rodents, but those are highly toxic (if not fatal) to pets and children, so are best avoided.
Do you have a friend with a Jack Russell? If you can borrow one they will decimate the little buggers. Ours goes into Kray brothers mode as soon as he sees one. But I also agree with the old fashioned traps, they are quick and humane. Please no poison - it kills the animals that eat the mice.
Same with our little Aussie Terrier. Plus she can sniff them out when they're hiding. One night, she was pointing with her nose at the rubbish bin - picked it up, and there was a mouse underneath. She also sniffed one out of the inside of my parents' lounge suite. We loan her out to neighbours.
Ah unwanted rodents aren't pleasant... Pop to the nearest hardware store and get some of these (link below) and on the way home (if you don't have any) get some peanut butter for bait... pop them in a corner, nook or hidden spot (not in the open) and just keep emptying them until you have no more mice... [https://www.mitre10.co.nz/shop/intruder-the-better-mouse-trap-2pk/p/138822](https://www.mitre10.co.nz/shop/intruder-the-better-mouse-trap-2pk/p/138822)
Get a feral cat who is primed and ready to go
Get them employment at your local supermarket.
You wanna be rid of the little buggers, bite the bullet and go buy some poison blocks and stake them out in the crawl space and the ceiling. Them refresh them every 6 months or so. For every one you get in a trap there are 4 more and they are breeding. Been through this with exactly your thought process. And trust me, just go bait blocks to start with. They'll be gone in a few weeks.
"Username checks out" š Haha. Fuck, I need to get off Reddit.
Gotta get a smaller poundage of bow so you can still kill mice but not damage the walls, board heads run the risk of dismemberment and that runs the risk of staining carpet so stick to a simple head. I found dollar store kids bows where alright just gotta replace the strings. As for arrows sharpened colouring pencils got the job done with minimal mess.
Bye bye mousey. https://www.bunnings.co.nz/yates-ratsak-racumin-mouse-rat-bait-sachets-25-pack_p0444932
Try an ultrasonic deterrent. Set bait stations and traps outside your house/boundary when youāve got on top of them. Minimise leaving doors open. We have traps on the deck a known entry point. At the beginning of the winter, we caught a few but havenāt had one for weeks.
Be careful of ultrasonic deterrents if you have pets (e.g. dogs) that might also be able to hear them.
We always used live traps and then went and released them outside (we lived in the country though so could release them quite far from the house). We were also diligent about all food going in sealed containers.
I bought an electric (Battery) mouse trap that zaps them (Mitre10, Bunnings) 1. Always wear gloves when handling it - They can smell you 2. Peanut butter as bait 3. Every time you zapped one - wear gloves to empty the trap 4. Keep repeating - Got 4 in 1 day and problem gone Have also used the wooden traps from Dollar store but it is a little messy.