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Mice in Our House! Ew! Help!?
We bought our house a little over a year ago now.
We went out of town last weekend and when we came back we found mouse droppings on our dining table, kitchen counters, all over the floors, etc. We were and still are GROSSED OUT!
My fianc? said he saw one run across the floor a week before we left but thought he just imagined it.
We bought those Black and Decker brand Ultrasonic Noise Wave Pest Eliminator things you plug into a wall socket and put one on each floor (we have 2 floors and a basement) and we also got the classic snap mouse traps (I put 2 in ithe garage). I actually got 2 mice already in the traps, I am a very humane person but not when it comes to mice. Disgusting. Not sure if the sound wave pest eliminators are working, I guess there really isn't a real way to know if they are or not.
Anyways...has anyone had this problem before? What did you do to get rid of them? Any advice is much appreciated!!! Thanks!!!
Re: Mice in Our House! Ew! Help!?
Hi...I ventured over to this board for the first time to ask my own question and saw your post.
We lived in Amsterdam and had a HUGE problem with mice because Amsterdam is overrun with them. My best advice is that you need to find their nest. Our flat smelled like dead mice all the time and we hired an exterminator to come in and find their nest. He found it under a cabinet (which he had to rip out to get to). There must have been 20 dead mice bodies back there. Then on top of that, our neighbors started construction on their flat and all their mice moved into our place when they ripped their walls out.
I would hire an exterminator and keep the exterminator coming. Don't make it a one time thing. Where there is 1 mouse, there are 100 more. Also, don't leave ANY food out anywhere ever. Even the smallest crumb can feed a mouse for a day. A cracker could feed a mouse family for a week. Put everything in plastic containers. Ours used to break into our bread box and eat through the plastic bag and put huge holes in our bread. We didn't get rid of them all together but we definitely put a hurting on their little herd.
Good luck with getting rid of them.
Good luck!
We had a terrible problem when they tore down a derelict building near us (all the rodents lived there and moved into our neighborhood). After trapping for a while with DIY electric traps, we eventually hired someone to come out. He trapped everything with snap traps and used mesh, Great Stuff, and wood to seal up every.single.hole around the foundation of our house. He said the only thing you can do is seal up the outside of the house, otherwise they'll always try to come in. We haven't seen anything since he sealed it up. It was the best $500 we ever spent. If you want to try to DIY sealing up the house, pay particular attention to holes around the plumbing, and where the foundation meets the house.
The worst thing in the world to attract them is pet food. They love it. If you have any sort of pet food or bird seed, be sure it's sealed up in a heavy duty plastic container or a metal container. I eventually had to just stop feeding birds in my yard because it was drawing them to our yard/house; they went crazy over the feeders. Also things like toaster and counter crumbs and gum in junk drawers are a big draw. Really though, sealing up the house around the outside is best.
Ditto Juno. Find them, get them out of the house and get the house sealed ASAP.
It doesn't matter what contraption you use on the inside, if you don't get the house closed up it will be a never ending battle.
http://pandce.proboards.com/index.cgi#general
Thank you so much for the advice! I was surprised to even find them in our kitchen because I don't leave food out. Never have and I am such a clean freak!
I haven't found anymore mouse droppings but I think I will call an exterminator in anyways. It's better to be safe then to think about them being in our house again! Blah!
Thanks again for the help!!!
They may have just been looking for shelter over the weekend and smelled food once they got in.
Animals have a strong sense of smell. If they're within range, they'll find food. You don't have to leave it sitting out... they can chew through cabinets and such to get to what they want. That's why mouse nests are usually in the walls or in the dark corners of cabinets and drawers.
http://pandce.proboards.com/index.cgi#general
I'm not convinced those plug-in things work either. We have them in almost every room of our house and I've seen spiders right next to them (and they supposedly get rid of mice and bugs like spiders). I've never found evidence of a mouse near one though, so maybe they do. Who knows.
Mice hate dryer sheets. If you lay a couple dryer sheets on the floor or wherever you see droppings, they'll go away.
Go around your house and find any holes they can get in. Mice can squeeze their bodies through a half inch hole.
The thing that has worked the absolute best for us are these peppermint packs. http://www.amazon.com/PACK-MOUSE-MAGIC-REPELLENT-Size/dp/B0071E5WOM We live in a really old house, in an old neighborhood. Everyone here has mice. Our foundation is small stones and very easy for mice and larger animals to get in. We have holes in our floors where pipes were years ago and no one ever closed them up. DH went around with some wood and spray foam insulation and closed up all the holes. And I went around placing those peppermint packs everywhere. When we moved in there were tons of mice. We had to demo the whole kitchen because I was so grossed out by it. Knock on wood, since we got the packets, not one sighting (of a mouse or droppings).