The mice have arrived

[thomaschick]

So I ready somewhere about Bobcat urine and how this will work really well? I just bought some and was curious if anyone else has used it and if so how did you spread it around the area?

 

[RonP]

I would not count on that.

Choose your bait accordingly.

There are some that claim no "secondary kill", lots of info out there.

 

[RonP]

Thank you.
My understanding is that the pest will take the bait back to the nest.
Won't this eliminate the possibility of dead carcasses having to be removed?
I worry about one of my flock getting to a poisoned mouse before I do.

I would not count on it.

There are many baits that claim not to have secondary effects, do you due diligence before using one.

 

[123RedBeard]

Quote:That's too much bait, smear it smooth so it just fills the holes...I use crunchy pnut butter so jam pieces in the holes, make 'em dig for it.
Have had them set too tight, guard against that by just barely hooking it (scary for fingers).
If it's summer and pnut butter is too melty, I use cheese instead-again just jamming holes full, none on surface.

Is this better?
Here is the hidey hole opened up ... A piece of dog food and peanut butter ...


I just got home, and had to "re-load"!

I left home about a week before my first post in this thread ...and left my 11 traps set ... two were tripped with the bait gone, one orange/yellow paddle TomCat, and the black "jaws" TomCat ...

I forgot that I had left my "live trap" Woodstream ... I figured that since I was gone for almost four weeks, that it would be dehydrated like most of the other eight I had caught ... I opened it up over the trash can, and it jumped out onto my leg, and I screamed like a girl! I brushed it off onto the floor, and tried to stomp it, but it scurried off ... fortunately I was out in our carport!

 

[123RedBeard]

The mice come in for the winter out of the back field ... The live one I caught (and let go!) I heard rustling in the leaves by the garbage can in our carport ...

So I put the gray trap with peanut butter and dog good out there, thinking it had been in the trap for a few days, it would be hungry!

It seems I'm right! This morning I found this:



Caught another one out back in another gray trap ... Those wack them in the noggin and hold them tight!

 

[aart]

Second from the bottom looks the best...I literally just fill a couple of the 'holes', I use chunky pnut butter so I cram a 'chunk' in the holes and wipe the rest off the surface.
I have also just crammed pieces of scratch grain into the holes, that worked too.

I had one of those live traps, so I could release one in the coop to train them to catch live ones.....didn't work for a week or so and I forgot about it.
Then found a decimated corpse, reset and again no joy.....but later found an escape hole chewed into the top, plugged the hole with a rubber stopper which was also eventually chewed out...I did catch one in there and gave it to the chooks to catch - that was interesting. Gotta keep a good eye on those I guess.

I bought a couple of those easy set and empty's the other day, I like them, we'll see how they work.

 

[123RedBeard]

I don't do the chunky ...

The live trap one I have I found that they too were escaping ... Back out the door! They could squeeze out over the top of the metal, and push/bend up the plastic top, and they were free!

I have since put a 1.5 pound hunk of casting lead on top of it! And bend the door a tad! I have caught three in it at ONCE! But it is almost my worst trap as far as numbers caught ... The black "jaws" looking one from Tom Cat has never caught anything! It came in a two pack, first one out of the package, the plastic trigger broke the first time I tried to set it! Since then it is just a feed dispenser! If I can see it is alive, I dip it into a bucket of water first. This one yesterday showed no movement ... So, I just opened it up!

I like the tan ones the best, although the gray ones work good, they do have a different trip/trigger system ... Most of the ones get the guillotine to the head! Never any food stollen, but not used by the mice as much, maybe they need to be taught to stick their head in the hidey hole! One I emptied yesterday, looked like a fresh caught, and it held a big plump pregnant one by just the nose, about half way between the tip and it's eyes ... Hopefully it cut off the air supply and it died quickly!

 

[hayley3]

I'm having mice issues and love the PVC idea but am afraid a chipmunk or squirrel or something will crawl in there if left outside. It's a great idea, I'm sick of mice eating my chickens food and having to pick out the droppings. I wonder if they make 2 inch pipe of some sort.

 

[RonP]

I'm having mice issues and love the PVC idea but am afraid a chipmunk or squirrel or something will crawl in there if left outside. It's a great idea, I'm sick of mice eating my chickens food and having to pick out the droppings. I wonder if they make 2 inch pipe of some sort.

You will not have any issues finding 2" PVC pipe and fittings.

Perhaps you should concentrate your efforts on location as opposed to size.

I would find a suitable location that is inaccessible the the rodents I did not want to attract.

 

[Egghead_Jr]

A chipmunk and red squirrel with fit in 2" PVC. Which is actually good as they are rodents that do all the same things mice and rats do: Overpopulate when abundance of food stores are around, eat a lot of your feed if allowed to. Migrate to any building to hole up for winter- your house and your neighbors house getting insulation damage and wires chewed.

I'm not a fan of pellet poison as when used I'd find it on the ground as it falls out of mouths as they try to stuff as many hard pellets in as possible. The chunx bait I like as it needs to be chewed off so all stays in the mouth. With that and a tamper proof bait station I leave it right in a corner of the run near the chicken food station. If using poison of any kind you should do a quick look about each morning before letting the chickens out of coop. I've only found one dead rodent (chipmunk) on the lawn in over 2 years and that was during the population explosion when I first started using poison. Nothing since and once the population is down you barely use any poison as it kills the rodents trying to move into the area near your coop.

Something like this is what I use and highly recommend: