What the HELL is this in my sofa cushions?!

[cakeforone]

Small DS had an accident on the sofa so we stripped the outer to put in the wash and went to clean the padding and saw all these black bits under the covering 😱

They look like droppings but I'm wondering how a creature got into the actual cushion through the cover. It's only about 2 years old and we've never left it for more than a few days at a time.

Hoping Mumsnet wisdom can help me figure out what it is and what the bloody hell we should do! Really feel like we need to destroy the entire sofa 😬 GRIM!

Aww, little mice. I wouldn't mind mice in my sofa. Rats, mould, other crawlers - yes. But I still think of mice as cute, fluffy things.

I'm horrified as I generally try hard to keep a clean and tidy home.

Eh, it's not a judgement on your housekeeping. They're sneaky little things who like food!

If anyone eats sitting on the sofa they've got a never ending food supply. ....

Have you tipped it up to see if there's any holes underneath?

Do you by any chance have a cat, OP? Ironically, we used to have mice in the house when we had cats; the cats used to catch them outside and bring them in for torture! The lucky ones escaped. We used to find them not only inside the sofa, but hiding inside curtains between the lining and the fabric, behind the dresser and even crouched amongst the leaves of pot plants! We haven't had any mice in the house since the last cat died!

It's not always about cleanliness we keep a really clean house but it can also be about location.
we used to get rats at our old place was right next to a farm if you poisoned them they would go in the floorboards and die and would make the place stink we got these sonic plug in things but didn't think would work but we never saw or heard another one they worked really well.

We tipped the sofa up and no holes in sight. We've checked the whole sofa now.

We live in the town and don't have any cats. All the other cushions are fine, it's just this one that seems to be affected. Will see if the traps manage to get anything.

We don't tend to eat on the sofa as a rule but occasionally would have a tea and some biscuits on it.