So, working on the news from their noses, they are deciding where to go live next.  If you advertise, by leaving out any form of food, they will be glad to move right in!  It is just like the sign shown here, if you leave the light on.

So, the best advice I can give you, is keep the mouse sign dark.  Keep pet’s food in plastic snap top lid containers.  Keep cereal, flour, and other dry stored food, in some kind of snap top lid container.  The mouse can chew through a plastic bag, no problem, but a hard 1/4″ inch thick hard plastic container, with a rubber gasket lid, will be a hurdle.  No food, no mice.

And, horror of horrors, if the fecal dropping is a 1/4″ long, black and crinkly like a mouse poop, but full of sparkly bits, you have just seen a bat dropping!  Bats eat flies and other insects, so the sparkles are the remnants of insects wings.

But, that is a story for another day!

The Lawnmower Story

Each year, in the spring, we have to take time to fix the gas powered motor, and replace the wires, and clean the motor out from all the mouse fur and nesting material that the little buggers cover the motor with.  They are busy in the winter, and the lawnmower makes a nice little house for them.  They most likely are very, very cold, and do not have a lot of warmth in this situation, but it shows the dedication they have to survive.  The scene is pretty much the same each spring, and we have learned to take some of the wires out, and save them until the following year.

If you are hearing more noise in this winter time, chances are you are getting some more visitors, and some real interest in your warm home.  The best you can do is bait, and not set your traps, and then set after a period of time.  The bait for free option works very well.  And, if a day comes, get outside and caulk any holes around your home.  If you have areas that are larger than 1/4″, you need to fill in that hole.

They will use your walls insulation for their new nest, if you leave those cracks open.  Then, you have the nasty task of removing either the siding or the  drywall, to remove the filthy insulation that has become a urine sponge.  Nice huh?

That being said, if you want to remove them from your habitat, your home, you will need to either hire an exterminator, or do-it-yourself.  I prefer the diy pest control solution, as the process is a long and windy road, and you will have less frustration by buying the right tools, using them in the most effective manner, and then, sticking at it.

One step, is to keep them from coming in.  If you have mice, they are going to follow the trail of pee from their buddies, to your home.  Stop them there.  If you have an hour, I can save you some further growth of your mouse population with caulk.  Silicon caulk.

Go outside, and get down at the 1-3 foot level, and investigate your home.  Wherever there are cracks bigger than 1/4″, you need to caulk.  Then, go buy more caulk, because chances are you did not buy enough.   When I started this project, I found some great holes, over 3 inches in width, and underneath the siding.  Whoa….

Then, you can repair, paint, and re-caulk as you need to.  The process inside, then will just be to capture your mice that you have living so comfy cozy in your walls.  Keep your spirit up, because they are very smart, and may test your patience.

Those crazy mice!  What are they doing?

Chances are, they are only responding to their immediate requirements and needs.  They need the following things to live really well!

1. Warmth

2. Food and Water

3. Certain levels of Humidity

4. Low light and Sound

If you were to see out a strobe light in your barn, set up a dehumidifier, a loud music system, turn on all the lights, turn the temperature down to 40 degrees, and then take away all food and water, you will have a mouse free barn.  Period, no questions asked.

But, that would not be a pleasant place for animals we need to raise, ourselves or our pets.  You see the problem.  Mice have a very particular set of requirements.  They need humidity at 55 degrees, temperature of 70-75 degrees, food and water that can weight as much as they weight, usually around 10 ounces, and, not a lit or noisy place.

That is a great tall order for an animal that seems to live on the generosity of others, don’t you think? They are very particular, almost regal in their demands.  So, let them find a better place to live.  Take away the food and water if you can, and add in some ultrasonic wave boxes, and you should keep out the biggest princesses.

The reason the baits are pinned, is it allows a lot of bait to be left in the boxes, and then a way to keep it at the box.  Mice and Rats love to steal food baits, and keep them all to themselves.  The fact that they will have to chew through the hard box bait, to remove it from the pin, ensures a good dose of poisoning.

I for one, believe this is a ridiculous practice, and a cruel one.  The mouse ends up bleeding to death, and turning into a messy mooshy mouse.  The poision system does not remove mice, it ensures that 2% of mice in a colony die a horrible death.

If a pest control expert is really serious about removing mice, he will trap and bait.  This is a long and labor intensive process, as it takes a few months of dedicated baiting, and visits to the traps.  But, there are humane options that actually can hold over 10 mice in a night, and they use electricity to zap the mice.  A much more quick and easy death for your little mouse guest.

This can be disturbing, and very unhealthy.  Not only do mice have disease in their bites, but they are carriers of fleas, lice and sometimes mites who produce mange.  If you have a large fly population that appears in one room, chances are there are a few dead mice in your walls.  It should be an occasion to remove the dry wall, and get those dead mouse bodies out of the walls, to ensure you have a healthy home for your family.

Take action or move out

Seriously, you can really harm your family if you live with mice.  They pee and poop everywhere, will steal hair from pets and children in bed, and often cause many disease related problems and bites.  They are more curious than mean, but if you have a mouse in bed with you, and you accidentally roll over on a mouse, they will bite until they have the ability to free themselves.

There is no better way to remove mice, than to establish a plan.  Go to our sister site at

http://www. meetyourmouse.com to learn more!

They have extraordinary hearing, and depend on others for survival.  If there was a catastrophic event in humanity, the mouse would survive for a few years, but pockets of mice, who had freely traveled the globe on our transport vessels and carriers, would stay put, and shrink.  The mouse would adapt to natural grains and found dead protein, but would not be as prolific as the mice of today.  It is clear they have adapted to our prolific agriculture, and our ability to grow food, store it, and move it.

The human factor is key in understanding mice.  If you consider the mouse a pest, it is related to a rodent weed premise for certain.  The mouse can scurry on a truck, end up in florida for pickup of fruit, jump off, and end up carrying a new set of fresh genes, to strengthen the local population there.  Or, run along a dock, smelling its way onto a ship, and end up from China to America, and live in California for a year, building its life there.  Any time you see a ship yard, a train depot, a truck station, consider that there are thousands of mice, hidden, listening, and waiting for darkness.