What will kill mice and not chickens?

[Avian Allie]

It’s fall here, the weather is cool and leaves drop and the mice invade. I’ve already trapped one mouse and heard another last night. What can I do to get rid of them? The farmers have just been harvesting and we always get a few... but that needs to stop! Mouse poison can hurt my outdoor chickens, but I was thinking, what if there was a toxic food to mice that my avians can eat? What do you do to get rid of them?
I would diaper and bring my ducks indoors to eat them, but they’re scared to death of rodents. We can’t get a cat, and I have a hamster and rabbit that I don’t want injured by another predator. We already have electric repellent, sticky traps and humane traps. Our pantry is virtually mouse proof. The only food accessible is the rabbit bowl, but I don’t know how to help that. The dog food is even picked up! Yes we have dogs, but they are the type who will lick the hamster because he’s dirty not eat him.
Thanks in advance.

 

[CatWhisperer]

I have cats. They can be in the brooder with day old serama chicks and will not harm them. You just have to teach them what is acceptable. My cats have grown up and lived with small self confident parrots in the house so that probably helped. I also have a couple feral cats living with my chickens. They are well fed and have coexisted for 6+ years peacefully. I have never seen a rodent on our property. The closest I see is the occasional chipmunk that the cats catch.

 

[cmom]

Good luck... I don't know of anything. I use poison but it is in rat/mice bait boxes. Nothing can get to the bait but rats and mice. I have some in my barn which is behind my coops. I'm sure the rats and mice will travel between the coops and the barn. There is a little window above the bait in the bait box so the bait can be checked as often as you like. My birds don't go into the barn. I have had no problems only less mice and rats. I don't find them dead laying around. I'm pretty sure they go down into their tunnels and die and that is why I haven't found any dead rats. I check the bait regularly and replace as needed which has been rarely since there are few if any rats and mice.

 

[Al Gerhart]

You brought the rodents to the property by providing a chicken feed buffet. The responsible thing isn't to kill, the responsible thing is to remove the buffet by spending the $100 it takes for a decent treadle feeder. Google rat proof chicken feeder or search these forums and you will learn about the various types and the pros and cons of each. A spring loaded door is required, so is a counterweight system. A narrow and distant treadle will prevent rodents from overwhelming the treadle counterweight and spring loaded door. The types without these features can be just pushed open by a rat or wild bird.

 

[Avian Allie]

You brought the rodents to the property by providing a chicken feed buffet. The responsible thing isn't to kill, the responsible thing is to remove the buffet by spending the $100 it takes for a decent treadle feeder. Google rat proof chicken feeder or search these forums and you will learn about the various types and the pros and cons of each. A spring loaded door is required, so is a counterweight system. A narrow and distant treadle will prevent rodents from overwhelming the treadle counterweight and spring loaded door. The types without these features can be just pushed open by a rat or wild bird.

I’ve heard of those, they sound really cool. But I’m afraid that a feeder won’t solve my problem, I’m surrounded by corn fields so every harvest season we get displaced mice in our house and feed shed. I’ve tried humane traps and most every repellant you could imagine, but they don’t cut it. I was wondering if there was a humane/chicken-safe poison I could use to help rid the mice, I can’t use traditional poison because my free range birds might be secondhand killed not to mention local wildlife. There is no way to rodent proof the amount of hay and grains I have. Thank you for the suggestion in any case.

 

[ducks4you]

I do NOT advise poison. Lots of animals eat mice. When I kept my chickens in a stall in the barn, the chickens ate baby mice any time they saw them. But, getting your chickens to solve your mouse problem is like getting your horses to eat all of the 1st year burdock. AIN'T GONNA HAPPEN!!
I might have a solution for you. I suggest that you create some chicken wire boxes and put plain old traps with bait in them. The mice can get in, your chickens won't get hurt, and no predators will eat mice that have consumed poison. Especially Warfarin, which is the #1 mouse poison. The mice bleed out and die. So do the cats that EAT the mice that ATE the Warfarin. These might not be YOUR cats, but they might be your neighbors cats. A Vet told me a long time ago that the mouse is the perfect food for a cat which is why they love to kill them. Mine usually leave carcasses around, and I always feed my good kitties so that they will have the good health to hunt well.
I also posted on another thread, that you can, next spring, plant a patch of catnip and attract your neighbors cats to clean out Most of your mouse problem. I, too, have a farm field in the back of my property. The mice are nocturnal. They are always there, you just don't see many of them.

 

[aart]

Properly set snap traps have worked the best for me,
in house/garage/sheds/coop,
the old school type with the wooden base and small metal trigger mechanism.
Two key things that upped success immensely:
-Place the bait end of trap against a wall or other flat vertical surface(like a box at least 6" tall).
-Cram some solid bait tight into trigger so they have to really dig for it.
I've found sunflower seeds or a chunk of corn from chicken scratch mix to work very well for bait.....and no more pnut butter mess.
Been catching mice in under-house garage and sheds(rarely in house thank goodness) for 20 years, way before chickens happened here.
I keep some always set, and am especially vigilant in spring and fall.

 

[Darciand]

Mouse x isn’t poison and works too.

 

[Al Gerhart]

I’ve heard of those, they sound really cool. But I’m afraid that a feeder won’t solve my problem, I’m surrounded by corn fields so every harvest season we get displaced mice in our house and feed shed. I’ve tried humane traps and most every repellant you could imagine, but they don’t cut it. I was wondering if there was a humane/chicken-safe poison I could use to help rid the mice, I can’t use traditional poison because my free range birds might be secondhand killed not to mention local wildlife. There is no way to rodent proof the amount of hay and grains I have. Thank you for the suggestion in any case.

Mice generally will live within a few dozen feet of their feed source, rats about double that, any more and they will not last long due to predators picking them off. So clean up the area so there are no protected paths from the food to shelter. If you are a farmer with grain bins that aren't rat proof I would understand but most of us have used 55 gallon steel barrels for storing animal feed.

Poison is not the way to go because it kills off the natural predators and rodents always wise up to what it is and refuse to take the bait.

Good luck to you on solving this.