Mice in my coop!

[Hughes Wildlife Farm]

I put the caps on to keep the rats pit at night

 

[cmom]

I had a severe rat infestation in one of my coops. There was no way I would be able to trap them all there were so many when I started renovating the coop. First I move the birds to another coop and when I started tearing the coop apart where I needed to, dozens of rats of all sizes poured out. I'm not exaggerating, they had built nests in the ceiling and in the walls I had in that coop. I put poison in that coop. I did find some tunneling under the coops I'm sure were from the rats. I put the poison in rat bait boxes and only the mice and rats could get to the bait. I shut the coop up first and left the bait in for a few days and checked and replaced the bait as necessary. To my surprise for the number of rats that came out I only found a couple of dead rats that I disposed of. I think the others went into their tunnels and died. This is what I used. I first used the bait that came with the bait boxes but the rats didn't seem to care for it so I tried some different bait and they seemed to love it. I also put a couple of the rat bait boxes in our barn which is behind some of the coops. There is a little window above the bait to make it easy to check it as often as you want. Good luck...

 

[ValerieJ]

View attachment 1945602
I like the water trap in the coop.

I don't know what a water trap is, but I have an idea it traps a mouse in water and drowns it. Imagine how horrible it would be for the mouse to try to swim until it couldn't and then drown. What a terrible death. I hope I'm wrong about this. There are humane ways to kill a mouse.

 

[cmom]

I tried the water bucket and even put a ramp on the bucket for the mice and rats to climb up on. I filled the bucket about 2/3 full and floated sunflower seeds on top of the water. Eventually I threw it out because it started to stink and a lot of the sunflower seeds sank.

 

[DobieLover]

Hello and welcome to BYC! Glad you joined.
You've gotten good advice. Choose what works for you and tackle the problem. Good luck.

 

[BullChick]

I don't know what a water trap is, but I have an idea it traps a mouse in water and drowns it. Imagine how horrible it would be for the mouse to try to swim until it couldn't and then drown. What a terrible death. I hope I'm wrong about this. There are humane ways to kill a mouse.

Yeah, that’s the part you need to rationalize. I keep a bucket of water in the storage area after turning off the spigot for the season. When I had a problem with mice, they were drowning themselves without prompting. That and a few other issues got me to stop thinking so much about it. My chickens were safe, and it cost me nothing.

 

[drumstick diva]

Welcome to Backyard Chickens, hope you will enjoy it as much as we do.

 

[goldysgirl]

Sorry to hear of the mouse problem.

Where do you keep your flock's feeders? And what type of feeders do you use? Any food left laying around in a coop or run will attract mice (and rats). Some people have had success using treadle feeders...if you use the Search Forums tool, you can find information about those. Some simply remove all food from the coop & run at the end of each day (be sure to put it back out in the mornings).

Traps can work, either the kind you buy (like the ones @ValerieJ mentions) or the kind that can be handmade. Poison left out for rodents can be a danger to poultry so be very careful using that.

Here's an article from the Learning Center that might be helpful:
mouse-chicken-pests-how-to-protect-your-chickens-from-mice.47699

Best of luck!

Yeah, I never use poisons as it presents a danger to anything that can get into the poison or anything that eats a poisoned mouse. I had a large fowl cochin hen that used to kill and eat mice.

 

[007Sean]

Howdy and Welcome to Backyard Chickens.

Happy to have you here with us. Enjoy your time here at BYC!

Thanks for joining our community!

 

[aart]

they are making my chickens sick!

How are they making your birds sick?
Welcome to BYC! @trinityZ61

Do an on site search on 'water trap'.

Bucket trap.