To ask for urgent help as to how to catch a mouse?!

[ChristmasMouseInHouse]

Help! I have a mouse in my living room and my kids (one is SEN is case people think they are overreacting) are freaking out!

We have put down some humane traps but is there anything else we can do?

We have regular mice due to a cat that is great at catching but lets them go once inside We let the cat look for a minute or two, then when we've worked out where it is, we whip away the piece of furniture and drop a tub over it. Cardboard under the tub and out the front door. The cat flap is on the back door so the cat has to go all the way around the house to find it again, which gives it time to scuttle off.

@mehchristmas

Method 1: Get a large bowl and fill it with a bit cooking oil. Blob of peanut butter in the middle of the oil. A ramp or bridge for the mouse to climb over to get into the bowl. It will become oily and wont be able to climb out. Release oily mouse outside.

Method 2: Get a bucket and fill it about 1/4 full of water. Get a stick wider than the bucket and an empty toilet roll tube. Stick stick through tube and put a blob of peanut butter on toilet roll tube. Balance stick on bucket. Position bucket where mouse can climb in. When they stand on the tube it will roll round and the mouse will fall in the water and eventually drown.

These both sound very cruel.

Put down a wellie or bucket. They will think it is a safe haven and run into it

Bait your humane traps with food and cotton balls soaked in water. The poor little things get dreadfully thirsty trapped inside.

@mehchristmas

Method 1: Get a large bowl and fill it with a bit cooking oil. Blob of peanut butter in the middle of the oil. A ramp or bridge for the mouse to climb over to get into the bowl. It will become oily and wont be able to climb out. Release oily mouse outside.

Method 2: Get a bucket and fill it about 1/4 full of water. Get a stick wider than the bucket and an empty toilet roll tube. Stick stick through tube and put a blob of peanut butter on toilet roll tube. Balance stick on bucket. Position bucket where mouse can climb in. When they stand on the tube it will roll round and the mouse will fall in the water and eventually drown.

Do you have a diagnosis for your personality disorder?

I'm not humane. Snap traps, we go out (dc with sen) Dh or grandad checks and disposes. We are in country though so little bliters get into house quite often.

If it hasn't been nesting in your house then just open the doors and go upstairs. As soon as it's quiet, it'll leg it for the outside. Your house isn't it's territory so it won't want to be trapped inside.

When my parents had mice we trapped them with banana on the mouse trap.

They were eating through everything in their airing cupboard.

If you do catch it in a humane trap (they do sometimes work and yes, mice love peanuts and chocolate so bits of Snickers are good bait) for goodness' sake don't just take it outside, or a little way down the road. It will come straight back in. You need to get into the car and go at least a mile to make sure it can't find you again.

How do I know? A mouse we had in the house had a white front leg so we easily recognised it. We caught it three times, took it further away each time and the third time in the car to a field on the other side of town.

Our cat brings in a few, and humane traps work fine. They like chocolate. I sometimes also make a little "house" out of a tissue or other small box/paper bag with shredded tissue inside and food at the edge to tempt them in. Once inside you can pick it up and let them go outdoors. Like the boot idea above really. I could never be cruel to an animal.

We just got a killer mouse trap and it caught the mouse within 24 hours. Horrible but effective.

We have a cat now but she would not know what to do if we had a mouse in the house now, she’d be as clueless as DH and I were🤣

@HollowTalk

Can you get to a hardware shop or B&Q? They sell pellets. If you put them in the corner of the room then you won't see the mouse again.

You might not see it again but you are very to smell it's rotting corpse and see the flies that infest it as it putrefies. Poisoned rodents will feel ill and weak and try to get back to their nest. As this tends to be under floorboards or behind skirtings (or as people upthread have said, inside furniture) where they then die.

Snap traps are kinder overall, a sudden death rather than a drawn out poisoning and much more hygienic as you can see the dead body and dispose of it very quickly.

@CheshireCats

Also, you are very unlikely to have just one mouse!

We only ever had one mouse.

I assumed it had run in through the open door when I pressure washed the decking and hid behind the tumble dryer in the utility.
I tried every tip going from turkish delight to banana and the little bugger wouldn't go in the traps (humane)
Eventually I left the door open for a day and then emptied the entire room into the garden, leaving the appliances out overnight (It was summer). Never did find it but it did do the trick.

a trail of hot chocolate powder to a trap which has peanut butter in it - they love choc & peanut butter

You can buy plug-in devices which emit a high pitched noise that mice hate. We had some scrabbling about above our bedroom but since we've plugged one in they've scarpered somewhere else!

Mice are nearly blind and like to run alongside things like skirting boards- so place any traps along the edges of rooms.
I bought clean kill traps from Wilko. Brilliant as you don't have to handle the body. Nutella did the trick.

Humane traps can be cruel as you let mouse out, it doesn't know it's bearings and dies.

Instant clean kill better I reckon. Kinder than poison too rich is a miserable death.

No action on the humane traps but we have been in the lounge a lot of the day so not surprised it's not surfaced. Got everything crossed that it comes out overnight and we manage to capture it. We have seen mice in the garden and I don't mind them being there - it's a complete accident that it ended up actually inside the house!

Will look into snap traps to collect tomorrow if no luck overnight. There is no way out of the lounge other than the door which we will plug up overnight

i would burn your house down if i was you. (yes i have rodent phobia!)

Nutella in quick kill traps always works for us. I get those grey tube jobbies, the mouse goes in to eat the nutella, and snaps it's neck. You can shake the dead mouse out and wash and use again, or it you are squeamish, just throw the whole thing out.

You are unlikely to have one mouse.

Get rodent mesh and block off your garage door. Check for other holes and block with steel wool.

Humane traps either release them to go in someone else's house or into unfamiliar territory where they will die slowly.

Use baitboxes (poison but the kids can't get it) or electric traps (also child safe). Or snap traps with wine gums.

@ChristmasMouseInHouse

No action on the humane traps but we have been in the lounge a lot of the day so not surprised it's not surfaced. Got everything crossed that it comes out overnight and we manage to capture it. We have seen mice in the garden and I don't mind them being there - it's a complete accident that it ended up actually inside the house!

Will look into snap traps to collect tomorrow if no luck overnight. There is no way out of the lounge other than the door which we will plug up overnight

One other thing about humane traps: check them reasonably often if you can. Mice can get dehydrated in them very quickly.

Our cat regularly brings mice in.
The first thing to do (obviously) is figure out where the damn thing is. They can make themselves tiny and hide in the smallest of spaces. Keep moving furniture until you have found it.
Then try and corner it into one area of the room. We then poke at it with the mop and try and direct it in the direction of the bucket and, once it is in there, take it outside.
One very civilised mouse did just stroll out through the front door one day. I look back with affection on that mouse!

My cat is a past master at fetching back home completely un-injured mice and rats. I've caught loads in my humane trap with peanut butter on a bit of cracker as bait. Leave the traps alongside the skirting boards. I've also managed to catch them in an upturned Tupperware box several times when ie been able to work out where they are and chase them into the open but you have to not be frightened of them if they run towards you!

I hate it but the most humane kill trap (I know I know) I’ve found are the electric rat traps that zap them the minute they walk in. It was the only thing that dealt with our mouse problem in my old flat. You can Amazon prime them if you have it.