Mice - what to do?!

[TheCatThatDanced]

Well this had to happen didn't it?!

Had a cat for the past 5 years (he was 5) - very sadly just after Easter he became very ill (swelling on brain and epilepsy and then developed diabetes from steroids) and had to be PTS.

We had a mouse infestation in the kitchen and even when he was ill he caught a few mice bless him!

Yesterday a kitchen cabinet fell down in the lean to and so I brought a large bag of bird seed into the kitchen not thinking, today it has a small hole in it and birdseed coming out... we must have mice!

Thinking of setting traps for mice.

We were after getting a new kitten/kittens in the future but they won't catch mice so young will they?

Mouse traps baited with peanut butter. Mice run along beside the wall so put the traps at 90° angle to the wall.

Peanut butter is more tasty than cheese to mice and because it's a paste they have to work at it to eat it so more chance of the trap catching them.

That's not very vegan.

I'm usually reluctant to recommend getting another cat, as speaking from bitter experience they can bring in more mice than they catch.
But if you're thinking of getting another cat, then get one ASAP.

AbsoluteFannyOfAWoman

I'd honestly really rather a cat caught mice than traps or poison! And I'm not vegan.

EatingBreadandHoney - whilst the cat was alive and hunting (he was excellent actually...) we also baited traps with peanut butter.

Mice turned their noses up at it...!

twilightcafe - maybe I'll have to bite the bullet and get an older kitten - maybe 8-9 months old and pray his DCat mum has taught him hunting skills!

twilightcafe - we are in a row of Victorian terraced houses about 6 of them - for years no mice problem. Then suddenly I think all houses bar one has had mice there - us and the NDN has/had a cat, the rest of them didn't but another NDN had a 'Cat visitor' - don't think it caught much mice.

Current NDN with a cat, he's a hunter but doesn't seem overly good at catching the ones in our house unlike my poor dead DCat - he really was on a mission whilst they were there and whilst he was sick and before he was PTS caught 3.

Is there a cat shelter near you? You could have a new kitty in a few days.

Put anything edible (including bird seed) high up on a shelf or in a cupboard with nothing nearby that they can climb up. (A mouse climbed up the air vents in the back of our fridge, across the top of the fridge and then wriggled through a tiny gap in the cupboard door above the fridge to gorge senseless on cereal. We changed the angle of the fridge and filled in the gap and have never had another visit since.

I live quire rurally and get little field mice. I keep peanut butter baited traps and they work. It's not pleasant, but thr most humane way to kill them.