Mice making me anxious and can't sleep

[PandaAtTheZoo]

Found out we have mice about 11 days ago. Put down some traps and caught 3 in my downstairs toilet/ laundry room. Called the council pest control and they came round for a small fee and put down some bait station boxes last Thursday. Also told us to put mesh over ventilation bricks once the mice have gone. No more mice found in traps and no dead mouse smell. Thought that might be it until I went into the downstairs toilet and saw a live mouse standing between my two snap mice traps. Have they become trap shy? Council pest control not returning until Thursday. I feel very very anxious and losing sleep. Feel like I might burst out crying. Any advice? Thanks

I'm sorry! I had similar recently and totally know how you feel. I couldn't sleep at all. I paid a private pest control man to come. He came on a Friday and then a Tuesday. He filled in 4 (tiny) holes on the outside of the house. (needs to be the size of a biro (width) for a mouse to fit through). He put peanut butter on the traps - apparently they like that.

Does anyone in your circle have a cat that can be a guest at your house for a few days?

Even the smell of a cat can scare mice away.
I heard something on the roof in the middle of the night 2 nights in a row and let our cat sleep in the bedroom since then. It immediately stopped.

Would private pest control be better than council one? The council one looked around the property and said about mesh over ventilation bricks. Unfortunately don't know anyone with a cat. I put chocolate on the snap traps, should I start using peanut butter?

I also heard that putting some pepper around the places where they are coming in the house might help. Not sure if it works but the investment to buy a jar of pepper might be £2 if you don’t have one in your home so might be worth a try. Appearently they hate it.

Does anyone know if the bait stations work well?

www.simplemost.com/all-natural-ways-to-deter-mice-from-getting-inside-your-warm-home/

Not sure how they are coming in. Pest control guy didn't mention finding any holes, other than saying about covering the ventilation bricks. Think there could be a nest behind my washing machine in downstairs toilet as that's where I keep finding them?

We get mice. But upstairs they come through the loft somehow never down stairs.
Mars bar is fantastic bait. Wire wool and filler/expanding foam all holes they can get through a biro space, I sleep downstairs when they come in. I totally understand your fear.

Wire wool to block absolutely any hole. The small private pest control companies tend to be solution focussed and will endeavour to find the root cause. Bait boxes work but not in a couple of days. Get traps. Chocolate or peanut butter. You can also get tracking dust to see where they’ve been. Awful. I feel for you.

Also I’m still filling holes. Old house. They haven’t got through the wire wool and filler just to clarify ☺️

private company is the only way i think - weve had mice for years and the council didnt do much to help. I have a musophobia so i can relate.

If you don't know anyone with a cat are there any nosey cats around? Both myself and a few friends' have had to put up with a random local cat "visiting" us particularly if it is raining outside, and I know people who have cats that go "visiting".

No advice but . It’s crap, isn’t it?

I second Mars bars as bait. Chocolatey, but also sticky. Very successful. We have them coming into our kitchen at the moment. I had a massive row of traps lined up where the were coming in. It's very stressful and I hate going in there at the moment.

I live in an old victorian conversion and there were holes that just weren't possible to fill without major renovations, like behind kitchen cupboards etc. Every year I would get mice, finally get rid of them, to have them back the following year! I've now gone with getting two cats! While they haven't actually caught any, as a pp said, the smell alone is enough to keep the mice away. I think it's extremely difficult to get rid of them long term unless you can literally block every hole, which isn't always practical.

Please can someone recommend a private company in London to find and block holes. Thank you.

I feel your pain OP, had mice before and utterly traumatised me, Id rather a rattle snack loose in my house than a mouse.

Place the traps against the wall, short side against the wall- so they have to run over the trap. Use peanut butter as its stickier. Bait boxes can help too to keep down the population.
You have to find their entrance point though and block the gaps with wire mesh.

Please can someone recommend a private company in London to find and block holes you can do this yourself

I feel your pain. We had A mice infestation it was truly awful.

The council were in no rush to help us so we used a private pest controller who was brilliant.

He quickly located the entry point and their nest and advised us how best to sort that out.

He put down open plastic bowls of very strong (licensed) poison in places he identified they had been.

Within days we started to get a horrific smell throughout the house meaning they had started to die.

After 2 weeks the smell had gone and we haven't had a rodent problem since.

Meant to add, bait boxes and poison available to the general public did absolutely nothing for us.

We had mice IN our washing machine once. They were nesting in it. Why it didn't frighten them out when it was running I will never know, or maybe it did and they went back when it wasn't in use, but the pest man found a mouse-nest in there.

AskingQuestionsAllTheTime where were they nesting in your washing machine? All the mice I have caught have been in toilet next to my washing machine is. Could they be nesting in my washing machine. I hate having to go in there to do laundry. Can they get into the drum? Is is still hygienic for me to use washing machine to so laundry?

You need to find and get rid of the nest or they will keep coming in. Are you a terrace house? Is it likely that the nest is elsewhere in someone else's home or garage?

Get rid of any sources of food that they might be eating - check all your cupboards for evidence of the mice. Put everything possible in plastic boxes - cereal, rice, pasta etc

Move any bird food away from the house (although I think this tends to attract rats rather than mice).

And use poison to kill the nest rather than just traps.

Did you wash snap traps and not touch them with bare hands as smell can put them off.

Fill all holes in floor, around radiator pipes etc with wire wool and push down with chop stick. You can cover floor with flour at night to see where they are going