Regarding those "humane" traps...
We have a big mouse problem in our house, since the house is so old. We battle them every year, and just manage to stay on top enough to live decently. I used to do the mouse bait a lot, but then one of the dogs found some, and we had a $225 vet bill. I actually still use the bait, but only in areas like inside cupboards that the dogs can't get into.
We bought two humane traps for about $30 apiece at Green's Feed, thinking it would save us money. They are somewhat effective... they do attract the mice. But we'd wake up in the middle of the night with mice clanking around in there and screaming to get out, and we'd have to empty it at 2am to make it stop. And if they didn't wake us up screaming, half of them were dead by morning anyway. I would check the traps once or twice a day, and still half of them died. Within a month, the mechanisms didn't work as smoothly, and the mice would get back out after a few hours in the trap. So I'd hear a mouse clanking around in there at about 5am, and we'd get up at 7am to empty it, and he'd be gone. Now I have one of the traps in the breezeway cupboard next to two snap traps. I haven't caught a mouse in the humane trap for over a month, but I know they're in there because I get them in the snap traps at least two a week. And as far as the traps in the coop... the dust gets in the mechanisms and keeps them from closing smoothly. So mice get in and get right back out.
And those cheap snappy traps kill them instantly. Snap. Dead mouse that got one tasty lick of peanut butter. Call my husband to empty the trap, set it again... within a day or so there's another snap, and another instantly killed mouse.
If you decide to do the snappy traps, you could take a terracotta flower pot and use a Dremel to carve out a mouse-sized hole, and put the snap trap in there on a piece of wood. If the flower pot was heavy enough, the chickens couldn't overturn it.
I used to have more sympathy toward the little varmints, until I was cleaning mouse poop out of cupboards that contained food items or kitchen appliances. Yeah, that's all I need. "Sorry, doctor, I don't know HOW my kids got hanta virus!!!"
We have a big mouse problem in our house, since the house is so old. We battle them every year, and just manage to stay on top enough to live decently. I used to do the mouse bait a lot, but then one of the dogs found some, and we had a $225 vet bill. I actually still use the bait, but only in areas like inside cupboards that the dogs can't get into.
We bought two humane traps for about $30 apiece at Green's Feed, thinking it would save us money. They are somewhat effective... they do attract the mice. But we'd wake up in the middle of the night with mice clanking around in there and screaming to get out, and we'd have to empty it at 2am to make it stop. And if they didn't wake us up screaming, half of them were dead by morning anyway. I would check the traps once or twice a day, and still half of them died. Within a month, the mechanisms didn't work as smoothly, and the mice would get back out after a few hours in the trap. So I'd hear a mouse clanking around in there at about 5am, and we'd get up at 7am to empty it, and he'd be gone. Now I have one of the traps in the breezeway cupboard next to two snap traps. I haven't caught a mouse in the humane trap for over a month, but I know they're in there because I get them in the snap traps at least two a week. And as far as the traps in the coop... the dust gets in the mechanisms and keeps them from closing smoothly. So mice get in and get right back out.
And those cheap snappy traps kill them instantly. Snap. Dead mouse that got one tasty lick of peanut butter. Call my husband to empty the trap, set it again... within a day or so there's another snap, and another instantly killed mouse.
If you decide to do the snappy traps, you could take a terracotta flower pot and use a Dremel to carve out a mouse-sized hole, and put the snap trap in there on a piece of wood. If the flower pot was heavy enough, the chickens couldn't overturn it.
I used to have more sympathy toward the little varmints, until I was cleaning mouse poop out of cupboards that contained food items or kitchen appliances. Yeah, that's all I need. "Sorry, doctor, I don't know HOW my kids got hanta virus!!!"
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