I am really getting really frustrated by a crafty mouse! Now that I am stuck at home most of the time I am not driving my daily driver more than 2 or 3 times a week. I could tell a mouse was hanging out under my hood of my seldom moved car, on my battery.
First I bought a bait station which I placed in front of my garage near where I park the car. I have only seen ants feeding on the bait so far!
Next I decided I'd try a mouse trap. I put a trap on my battery with peanut butter on the trigger. Next day peanut butter was gone but the trap wasn't triggered!
So I put more peanut butter on the trigger, and trimmed some poison off the DCon cube from the bait station I put in the peanut butter.
Next day the peanut butter, and poison was gone! Trap still not triggered though.
Ok, try again, next day peanut butter and poison gone,and trap snapped, but no dead mouse in the trap!
Alright, new plan. I put a sticky pest control sheet on my battery with a little stack of barley malt seeds on it. So today I check, and the sheet has been chewed on, most of the seeds are chewed up, and there is even some mouse hair stuck to the sheet, but no mouse! How does this little bugger manage to continue to outsmart me!!!!!! Should I just hand him the keys to my car??
I'm starting to get the mental image of the coyote and the road runner!
I had a mouse like that , I used a 5 gallon bucket & a T bar across it , glued bait at the end of the T bar & when the mouse wnet for it the T bar flipped dropping it into the water drowning it
Had a similar issue with a mouse that kept licking the peanut butter off the trigger but wouldn't spring the trap. Go a raisin and super glued it to the trigger. That way he'd have to tug on the raisin to try and remove it and would trigger the trap. Put a small amount of peanut butter on the raisin to entice him. Worked like a charm. Next morning dead mouse in trap. Good luck.
I did something similar the time I mixed Dcon in with the peanut butter. I took a tack and put it through a hole in the plastic trigger, impaled a couple seeds on it, then smeared peanut butter on it along with chunks of Dcon. I figured the mouse would tug on the seeds and that would trigger the mouse trap.
I must have looked like "Carl" in Caddyshack when he was making little animals out of plastic explosives to get the gopher, while I crafted my trap! :Stirring:
The next day, the peanut butter, seeds, Dcon, even the tack, gone, and trap wasn't snapped. :verymad: Was the mouse watching me from afar, dancing to the song "I'm all right" while I stood there looking under the hood at the clean trap scratching my head? :thinking:
I've heard of the bucket trick, not sure if that would work here as my car is outside and there's so many critters here in my suburban "forest". Lots of squirrels, who get into everything, birds, possums, even a chipmunk who lives under my stoop. Would they explore my boobytrap bucket or just mice?
Worth a try :bigthumb:
You don't have your trap adjusted sensitive enough. Bend the tab that the arm sits on to make it more sensitive.
Get a cat. He'll catch it and bring it to you dead or alive, probably alive and then drop it. 😡
My mousetrap has a plastic trigger so isn't adjustable to give it more of a "hair trigger". However I was just looking at mousetraps online and saw the one I have, looking at the info on it, I saw there are 2 settings for the trigger, vertical tab and horizontal tab. I've been setting it vertical. Maybe the other setting would work better. I'll get that mouse if it's the last thing I do! :pullinghair:
One thing I've learned with mice.. there's never just one.
Put peanut butter on the trigger, not just the bait plate. It worked for me.
My wife swears Peanut Butter and chocolate.
The peanut butter glues the chocolate to the trigger.
Works like a charm.
Peanut butter is good, but i use sticky glue paper. worlks great for everythig that crawls.Back when i used to live in rural Florida that was a required pest application. That along with cheap wal- mart brand carb cleaner for the bugs. Works like a charm.
Put up a tiny sign that says "No Mice", duh!
or...
Stuff hay & straw into a burlap sack & fashion it into the shape of a cat, sew buttons on for eyes & mount it on a stick. Then put it in you engine bay. Viola! A scaremouse.
or...
Turn the tables on him! Find where he lives, eat some of HIS belongings, and then poop on HIS house. That'll teach 'im!
Quote from: floorit426 on May 13, 2020, 04:00:38 PM
I'm starting to get the mental image of the coyote and the road runner!
:haha: :rofl:
I think what you need Brad is a smarter "mouse trap" ... I'll lend you my Doberman ... she is a relentless mouse hunting machine ... WAY better than any cat I have ever had.
My twenty pound cat would make a snack out of it! :yes:
With the bucket, you will get the chipmunk as well. Sometimes they can jump out of the bucket. but usually you only kill the nice. the other animals will get out. That bucket trick works great!
I got cats. have not had any chipmunk or mice problems since. Now I have a cat that wants me to serve her. Smart little creatures.
I make best use of talent like that, put him on payroll in charge of security! ;)
Quote from: Scooter on May 14, 2020, 12:59:26 PM
I make best use of talent like that, put him on payroll in charge of security! ;)
That task is left to my hundred pound German Shepard! the cat is head of rodent control. :yes:
I have some traps that are plastic, and have a cup for the bait. A hole in the flap that is the trigger. to get to the bait it has to step on the trigger plate and bam. the bast part is, ninety percent of the time they don't reach the bait. I toss the carcass out for the crows and just reset with out putting more bait in the cup. Tractor supplie is ware i got them. :yes:
Google 5 gallon bucket trap. I got 7 this winter. 3" of water in the bottom drowns them. Flawless.
Mice like to lick the peanut butter and not trip the trap . . Happened to me as well . . Use something that is more difficult to remove from the mechanism .. or adopt it as a new pet!
Quote from: 7E-Bodies on May 14, 2020, 08:22:34 PM
Google 5 gallon bucket trap. I got 7 this winter. 3" of water in the bottom drowns them. Flawless.
Seven? My buddy gets more than that in one bucket in one night..... He's always kept his barn & shop spaces pretty clean, sprays for bugs, puts out gopher bait & has a couple dogs that chase rodents & rabbits... But his neighbor doesn't do any pest control so at times the mouse population explodes... When that happens the bucket traps come out.. I've seen a dozen mice in one bucket & he sets up three buckets in different areas...
When he first tried it he didn't put water in the buckets & he thought the buckets didn't work.... Then he noticed mouse droppings in the bucket but no mice..... He put water in the bucket & suddenly he was catching allot of mice...
Try toilet freshener blocks or toilet bowl tablets. Just throw 4 or 5 p. under your car. Last winter I had a mice family who was addicted to the hood insulation. After using the blocks I have never seen the damn mice again. Dutch mice absolutely hate the smell and my garage smells fresh, like Lemon Ocean Blue ;)
In case you hang the freshener blocks in your engine bay, please take them out before you start your engine. The heat will melt the blocks and it will cause a terrible mess...
Did you get the mouse yet ?
Between the cats and this little devil, house and the yard are free of rodents.
Quote from: Chryco Psycho on May 22, 2020, 10:19:53 PM
Did you get the mouse yet ?
No! I found there were two settings for the plastic trigger on my mousetrap and tried using the other setting. Twice I found the trap triggered, but no mouse!
Both times I set the trap recently, I put a few chunks of Dcon bait from the cartridges they sell to put in bait stations, in the peanut butter. And when I find the trap triggered, the peanut butter and bait are gone so I assume the mouse ate it.
The other day I put a chunk of Dcon on the battery, next day, it was gone.
Have the mice developed cast iron stomachs and the poison doesn't affect them, or are there dozens of them and I'm poisoning a few and their brothers and cousins go under my hood after they die?
I'm tempted to try the bucket trick but don't have a spare bucket. I'll pick one up next time I'm at the store, as I don't want to drill holes in my car washing bucket.
I'm also concerned with drowning my chipmunk. Though he's pissing me off now too, he dug out a bunch of gravel and sand from under my stoop where he lives!
I just planted my vegetables, and in a couple months when I start getting tomatoes, the squirrels will get into them.
Damn rodents!
Hate to say it but chipmunks will eat wires also. Not as often but I've seen it.
Try putting the bait traps onto the middle of the sticky pad. maybe you can get one to stick to the pad if he's up there trying to get to the bait.
not sure why you have to put a hole in the bucket , I just set a 2" wide piece of wood across the top with a T
I looked at pictures and videos online, and the ones I saw, both homemade and commercially available, had rods installed in holes drilled 180 degrees apart near the rim of the bucket. Then there was a collar on the rod so that when the mouse walked out on it to get the peanut butter in the middle, the collar would spin and the mouse would fall into the bucket
I've always seen the round ones with holes also.
but a flat piece with a T on it makes sense. That would work just fine. No holes needed or extra engineering.
Although once it's triggered you only get the one until you reset it right?
depends , mine would reset , counterbalanced to tip with the weight of a mouse & tip back without
I wonder if it;s his chipmunk friend that is the culprit! I have seam those striped vermin do enough damage to a car, that the owner had to use there comprehensive insurance to pay for repairing it. :bigmoney: