Meeses, Mices, and Mouses

Getting a lot of these little guys in my pole barn. There is construction in the area like trees being cut and dirt moved and such. Question 1 How does the bucket of water thing work with little mice? Forgot how to set it up. Question 2 what is a safe and effective poison to use in barn(no animals)? I am changing traps about 6 times a day with 2 or 3 each trip. Thanks a million again for any and all advice. Dave

Best bait I have found for traps is PEANUT BUTTER. I"ve been fighting the little guys in my barn too - around the array of rabbit cages. Little guys are pretty clever, however, many times they manage to lick the trap claen, without tripping it! Maybe creamy PB isn"t the best choice - Crunchy is real problem to bait the traps with. Best poison bait I have found is called "BLUE DEATH." Far superior to DeCon. Side by side, they will empty the Blue Death, skip others.. Had a few mouse problems in my basement last winter. They took a bunch of the bait - found it later in various places where they had stashed it. Wife was not happy when she found some in her spare dresser in the underwear drawer - in the utility room.

Bucket setting on the floor. Water about three inch from the top. A way for them to climb up the wall.

Plastic five gallon bucket with two little notches cut opposite each other at the top, run a little rod length-wise through a plastic mayo or peanut butter jar and set the rod in the notches so the jar is in the center and can spin on the rod. Coat the jar with peanut butter and set a little ramp up to the edge of the bucket. Water in the bottom of the bucket lets you see what you are catching, old motor oil works nice for about six months, if you see one floating in the oil it's time to change.

I use Havoc small throw packs and then Tom cat blocks. I put a row of finishing nails around the outside wall on the garage and put the blocks on the nils. The throw packs I use behind the freezers, under shelves, up in the attic, etc. I like the throw packs because you can move them easily if they don't get into them. The Tom Cat blocks work better for rats. Ramik is good for river rats too.

I keep the bait out 365. I have cats and dogs both. I have only had one issue and that was a puppy twenty years ago that got a bait pack out from behind a freezer in the garage. It did him in. The older animals don't seem to bother it any. With feed around I have to keep it around.

For the fellow that said he was putting it out and it was being eaten but he could not see any difference in the mouse/rat population. You need to put more out and in more places. I started on a boughten house a few years ago. Used almost twenty lbs of bait in the first week. The next week I use ten. Then the third week maybe a single LBS. It took that long to get them all feed. There are many more rats/mice than you think around a farm/field.

The EPA is going to crack down on the bait we can buy at the start of 2013. You will not be able to buy it other than in these bait house/stations. Throw packs and blocks are going to become illegal. At least that is what the local feed mill is telling us. I bought enough for ten years or so.

I heard about mixing peanut butter and plaster of paris into little balls. When they eat it, the extra large of calcium causes them to die. This is only toxic to rodents, I understand. I bought some plaster of paris at wally's a couple days ago, but have not tried it yet. If you google it, there is information out there.

I have been using bait bars that I buy at feed stores called "Just one Bite " I cut then into about 1" pieces and use them everywhere. Stuff really works. It even works on pocket gophers. I have found that the trick to using creamy peanut butter is to let it air and dry some before putting it on a mouse trap. Holds better on the trap.

(quoted from post at 19:20:50 06/24/12) Getting a lot of these little guys in my pole barn. There is construction in the area like trees being cut and dirt moved and such. Question 1 How does the bucket of water thing work with little mice? Forgot how to set it up. Question 2 what is a safe and effective poison to use in barn(no animals)? I am changing traps about 6 times a day with 2 or 3 each trip. Thanks a million again for any and all advice. Dave

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If you've got chickens and want some quality entertainment, skip the water and just smear a little peanut butter about 2 inches down from the rim of a 5 gallon bucket and set it against the wall or lay a board up against it. When you get a few mice in it, swing it around a little to get em dizzy then dump em in with the chickens and watch them sick bastards eat them......

Why not get a couple of snakes to help you out? We have a milk snake and maybe a blue racer hanging around the wood pile.

Larry

You never can trap them all. Poison is the only way to control large infestations. And it's a never ending battle. I started mixing warfarin with corn meal when I was 10 years old and have been baiting the meeses ever since. I hate meeses to pieces. I mostly buy the bar baits. Sometimes for mice I chuck the whole unopened packed back in a corner where the dog won't get it. For pack rats I break up the bar and dole it out. Them devils tend to take the bait to their nests and hide it.

Dave, I like your way with words LMAO!!.

(quoted from post at 05:59:16 06/25/12) Dave, I like your way with words LMAO!!.

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Used to have chickens and the wife sold the leftover eggs at work.... I moved something and a mouse ran out one day just to have a half dozen hens stumbling over each other to get at it and fought over it... Caught some in a bucket and did like I said... From that day on, wife sold ALL eggs at work and I either bought eggs at the store or from a place in the next town that kept the hens with a little less liberty......

How about getting a few cats? I started feeding a few of the strays two years ago when I started storing feed in my pole barn. Got 3 of them in there now, and they keep the mice under control. I've had 100 lb. bags of ground corn sitting for several weeks without any mouse damage. For about $15 in cat food a month, it's pretty cheap mouse control. Got one that never leaves the pole barn, the other two roam the yard for rodents, etc. Saw one last week carrying home a fresh dead rat from the neigbors grain bin.

Love to eat them mousies,
Mousies what I love to eat,
Bite they little heads off,
Nibble on they tiny feet. Get a cat. Ellis

5-gallon mouse trap:

Drill two holes in a plastic pail across from each other about 3 inches from the top.

Take a can with top and botton (soda can works) punch holes in top and bottom.

Thread a piece of wire or fish line through hole in one side of bucket, through the can and through the other side of bucket. Tighten the wire until the can spins freely.

Fill the bottom third of bucket with water and smear peanut butter on can.

Leave out overnight and harvest the water-compromised rodents in the morn.

Brad