Three cats, two mice, no sleep

[Barbara]

Oh my- with your house being so close to the great outdoors (that is fields etc.) there will sure be mice and they CAN get in houses. I am sorry that two of them didn't survive but I can see Juni and Lucy having a ball.
You may want to move this thread to General- more people will see it there

[happylabs]

LOL!

I am afraid you are going to have to kill them unless you want your house over-ridden with mice.

I will tell you my little story. Way back when I was young and naieve my husband and I had our first little home. There was an old shed that came along with the house. While cleaning it we found a nest of baby mice. I said "oh don't kill them". BIG mistake. That winter they took up residence INSIDE my house. At night we would hear them running in the walls. I didn't sleep for a week. We did do the unthinkable and get the snap traps. I am sorry but I refuse to have rodents running in my house. At the time we did not have any cats. I don't think my cats have ever had the experience of playing with a live mouse and I hope they do not get to.

Maybe your kitties have exterminated them all.

[Taz_Zoee]

I have heard of humane traps. But what do you do with them once you humanely catch them? Put them back outside so they can just come right back in? I'm afraid the only way (unless you can find where they are coming in and do as Edwina's Secretary suggested with the steel wool) to get rid of them is to kill them.

Oh, I just found this. Here is a link to homemade humane traps.

Taz was my mouse watcher. He'd sit in the kitchen for HOURS if he heard one. Then we'd know to go set traps in the garage. Sorry, not my choice. The owner of the house did the trap setting.



Good luck!!

[Cinder & Smoke]

Boots, da Mouser (NOT) rarely felt the need to either kill or eat a wayward
Mouse that was stoopid enugh to climb up the basement stairs to enter "Kat Country".

He'd discover the Intruder when the lil critter began raiding da Kat's Krunchie Kup
on the bathroom vanity ... "Hey - you wanna PLAY?"

"Play" to da Kat was to have a rousing game of "TAG! You're IT - now RUN!"
One Kat and ONE Mouuse could entertain themselves for about 45 minutes
(often overturning da Kat's litter box in the process).

It was *game over* when either da Mouse got smart and ran back under the
basement door to safety, OR died from a heart attack on the playground.

[sasvermont]

I will go under the sink and basin areas and put steel wool around the pipe area that is open enough for critters to come through. I will consider the traps, but often they catch the mice's leg and the little thing struggles so.

Heart attack sounds a bit cruel too, but at least they've been given a chance to run for the hills.

So far, no more mice......... I am sure the cats would welcome them back with open arms.......

Thanks for the advice.

[Edwina's Secretary]

I will go under the sink and basin areas and put steel wool around the pipe area that is open enough for critters to come through.

That is a usual route - around pipe areas. I had an apartment with mice. The landlord suggested a cat but offered no other help. I shudder when I remember how many mice I found.

Steel wool around the water pipes and drain pipes but also - if you have as I did then -- steam heat pipes.

Anytime I see any kind of opening in my house I stuff steel wool in it. A little quirk.

[Pinot's Mom]

Way back - my husband's and my first house with a mortgage - we had our now RB kitty Jamara. Jamara thought field mice were her toys. We occasionally got field mice. She would bat them around, claws receded, until the poor little things had heart attacks. This usually happened on the basement steps. We had to watch where we walked!

SAS-you probably have field mice, so they won't GET very big, there might not actually be larger ones. Not that this makes you feel any better! You do need to find where they're coming in, though. Ours were coming in with the plumbing behind the refrigerator. We were young, Jamara was young, no one was that concerned and we moved before it became a real problem, so I'm sorry, I don't have a solution! Good luck!