Good morning all.
I read somewhere that vermin aren't as attracted by a food source as much as they are a water source. That might hold true as I feed the bachelors inside their little coop, but leave water out for them.
Also the huge male rat we found dead was trying to drink out of our stock tank near the barn that I use to collect rain water from the barn roof for the birds. I use a heated dog water bowl for the birds in the main coop and I occasionally have found a drowned mouse in it. Maybe not a pleasant way to die but it gets the job done and in all honesty, is any way pleasant?
Come on guys, these are rodents we are talking about. Most of us would be flabbergasted if we truly knew the number of mice that are cohabitating with our flocks. I was. This past summer on July 4th I went to close up the coop before DH and I set off some fireworks and happened to shine my flashlight in the door. I swear at least 20 mice scattered for safety, some even burrowing down in the bedding to escape being located. Given the nature of our shed, I wasn't surprised that there were mice but the sheer number astounded me. I knew I had a serious problem and went to work distributing bait boxes where I knew the chickens and dogs couldn't get ahold of them.
Mice spread disease and filth. They poop and pee in our birds food and water supplies. They breed faster than rabbits. Consider this...
300 offspring
With an average lifespan of 18 months, and an average of
10 babies per litter, a single female mouse can produce more than
300 offspring in her lifetime, making careful sexing a necessity unless you wish to become a mouse breeder.
How Many Babies Do Pet Mice Have? | Animals - mom.com
Now consider how this number will escalate if you have 5 female mice residing in or around your coop.
Life is precious but there comes a point where you as practitioners of animal husbandry have to draw a line in the sand and do what you have to do to control rodents in your coop and on your property.
Drown, poison, trap (I've caught mice by the tail in spring traps so they aren't failproof either) beat to death or buy a bunch of Guineas or hunter chickens like Egyptian Fayoumis and let them deal with the problem (without the use of poison of course) The problem with guineas and hunter chickens is they aren't nocturnal like rodents are so back to plan A.
Find a method that works for you and use it, without guilt or bruising your conscience. I'd hate to hear that somebody got sick from a rodent borne disease like these listed by the CDC
Diseases directly transmitted by rodents
Hantavirus Pulmonary Syndrome
Hemorrhagic Fever with Renal Syndrome
Lassa Fever
Leptospirosis
Lymphocytic Chorio-meningitis (LCM)
Omsk Hemorrhagic Fever
Plague
Rat-Bite Fever
Salmonellosis
South American Arenaviruses (Argentine hemorrhagic fever, Bolivian hemorrhagic fever, Sabiá-associated hemorrhagic fever, Venezuelan hemorrhagic fever)
Tularemia
drowning is a horrible way to go! Even for vermin! Couldn’t do the glue thing either. I am too much of a softie for either I guess.
although I guess poison really isn’t any better. Probably much worse, actually. Plus probably poisons the hawks too which I hate. 
even if they do come for my birds a lot. I didn’t want to use the poison either but my dad insisted as it’s really the only thing that works. Although I’m not sure if it is working. They seem to have just moved to the other coop and I still saw a bunch of them a few months ago. I think what it did do is accidentally kill all the chipmunks. 
