Ultrasonic Pest (in particular mouse) Repellers - do they work?

[RaisingMissDaisy]

Hi
I seem to have a little furry squatter. Sightings are very sporadic, but I'd rather get rid. I have ordered a couple of humane traps and after that I was thinking of getting some ultrasonic repellers. Does anyone have experience with these? Do they work, and if yes, can you recommend any?
Thank you!

Yes. Mine work
we have budgies - we get mice, many of them.
I contacted a pest company,
In the meantime, we got a Sonic Repellant - no more mice.
Had to cancel the exterminator.
so, yes, I swear by them.

oh great, thank you! Which one did you get? or are they all much of the same?

Not in my experience.
We live in the country, backing onto a farm and we get mice in the house every winter. We haven't had any yet this year but it's still quite mild. As soon as the temperature drops they'll find a way in!
We've tried more or less every kind of repellant/trap (except glue traps which I think should be illegal) and have found traditional mouse traps baited with peanut butter to be the most effective. We do still have a few ultrasonic things plugged in around the house as they don't do any harm and may possibly reduce numbers, there's no way of knowing really. But they definitely don't keep the house mouse free.

thank you @MrsAvocet

They did not work for us, neither did the humane traps unfortunately.

We had to use a mouse extermination service in the end, the cheapest was via the council so your council may offer that service too if necessary.

Didn't work for me either.

I don’t think they work.

The only effective prevention we’ve found is cats.

The traditional snap traps do work - just need to be disciplined in putting them down every night until they come back empty.

No they don't work at all. Snake oil.

Get a Rat Zapper Classic - Electronic Rat and Mouse Trap that electrocutes them. It's very effective.

They don't work in my experience.

Listen to the Pest Control episode of Sliced Bread on BBC Sounds.

I had to send mine back as I could hear whatever sounds were being emitted. That probably means they were the wrong frequency but it was so annoying and in any event didn’t work!

Hello all, thank you for all these messages! I think I will give them (the ultrasonic repellers) a miss then...

and thank you @ArtInTheMediumOfTurnip for the Rat Zapper recommendation. The humane traps were delivered today, so I will give them a try anyway and take it from there

Thank you all

I was sceptical but after years of getting mice in the loft above our bedroom, which disturbed us at night, we put a sonar repellent up there about a year ago and have had none since. They were field mice (we back onto farmland), which we really didn’t want to be killing with traps, and so we’re glad that it seems to have worked, although it’s maybe just a coincidence!

Thank you @Yuiok I may just order some, I suppose it won't do any harm

first night with the humane traps was uneventful

Best of all, get a cat (or two).

In an ideal world, that would be the dream @Godesstobe

The one my inlaws got also repells teenagers and children so it depends whether you consider those undesirable pests.

My cat snores lazily on the sofa while a series of meece dance a jig on the top of my washing machine. Little blighters

Do not get a cat to deal with mice. We have two cats, they bring mice into the house, drop them or generally lose interest in them. We have snap traps to deal with the mice!

@StudioFocusTricky are you talking about cats or the ultrasonic plug-ins??

@Owlcat42 and @MousePolice that made giggle

this is the problem with reviews, there are always some that are positive and some that are negative, be it traps, cats or whatever. On Amazon for example, there can be 60% five-stars but then it's the 5% 1-stars that put me off...

@RaisingMissDaisy @StudioFocusTricky are you talking about cats or the ultrasonic plug-ins??

The ultrasonic plug-ins. Younger human ears can hear them and hate them.

@StudioFocusTricky 😮that's no good!

I don't have experience with ultrasonic but I do have experience of both poison and cats and I can tell you they are BOTH nasty.

What you need to do is to get a pest control specialist in and get them to investigate, fully, the places in which they are able to get into your home. My experiences:

Many mice in a flat. LL got a firm to put down poison. It was awful. Not only did it take months to take effect (they had to keep coming back), but the poor sods slowly died somewhere and in the meantime left trails of piss and blood all over my flat, because even after they started blocking up what they thought were the entry points, it was too late.

Mice can climb walls (and iirc up the interiors of drain pipes) and get through a hole the size of a pencil tip. That's why you need a specialist to find the entry points.

Cats are great at catching mice, but they'll bring you them, play with them, half maul them to death, then present them to you as a 'gift', and you then have to 'dispatch' them - because they very quickly get bored with killing them. And it's awful and it makes you feel bad.

So, that's my recommendation. If the ultrasonic is cheap, go for it, but you have to find the entry points. They need blocking up with - at the very least - wire wool.

In my experience, no.
The only thing that has worked for me is poison sachets (think they are called pasta) and having a rodent blocker installed in the drain that leads into the house. Not humane methods, but I was literally plagued with mice and rats for five years and it took its toll on my mental health.

thank you @KievLoverTwo I agree that, in order to deal with the problem at the source, so to speak, I will need an expert. I am going to make an appointment
@TellySavalashairbrush I can imagine it must be grim if they "walk all over you". I better try and get to the bottom of the problem before it's too late

Another issue with poison is that if they die under your floorboards, in your walls r otger inaccessible places the smell is absolutely repulsive. We had to rip our bathroom floor up to find a body and never used poison again after that. You wouldn't think that one dead mouse could be that much of a problem, but believe me, it was!