Did you use old fashion Victor traps? Nothing else come's close to working as well. Did you put peanut butter on the traps? Mice do not like cheese,regardless what Hollywood says. Leave the insulation where it is,the mice come out every day. Place plenty traps on solid surfaces,the mice will find them. If needed,lay 2x6 boards down in attic,mice would rather walk on hard surface than insulation.

thanks klem1 I did use peanut butter and I use the Intruder "The Better Mousetrap" which has given me success in the past. they are walking on the hard surface of the ceiling board under the batt insulation. I need to direct them towards the traps. I hope they find them soon.

The reason I reccomend traditional victor traps is because the trigger is super sensitive. Many dis-like them for that very reason because it make's them difficult to set. Are they licking the butter off traps? They need food,where are they getting it?

Don't know the food source yet. I just hard them for the forst time the other night. We had some nooise in the attic a couple of years ago and I was catching them almost immediately with the Intruder traps. But I easily accessed a spot with driopping so I knew they were in the specific area. So far they haven't touched the bait. The Intruder traps are quite sensitive too. thanks

Cold weather might be driving them from the fields to the comfort of your attic to bed down. They might be forageing the fields where they find seed they are used to eating. Traps against the foundation are effective for mice commuting between house and outdoors. If you have kids and pets,put trap inside a box with tiny doorways.

I'm sure it's the cold that's moving them inside. good ide about some traps at the foundation. thx.

FWIW, I called an extermninator and they said that they'd install some "bait traps" (essentially D-Con food stations that cause the rodents to seek water and theoretically die outside). They wanted $255 for the service. Guarentee was that if we still heard/saw signs of mouse activity they'd repeat the process at no charge. I can buy a lot of D-Con traps for $255 so I figure I'll try on my own for a bit first.

I believe you can achieve satisfactory results with less expense, effort and stress than if you contract with an exterminator. You already understand the expense part,allow me to explain the stress and effort part. Over the years I've contracted dozens of exterminators for various different pest in apartment and commercial buildings. Without fail if a rodent infestation proved difficult to control,exterminator said I must plug possible points of entry otherwise warranty isn't valid and I must pay ongoing fees. The most visible point of entry is brick weep holes which prevent condensation problems inside walls. Once those are plugged at your expense,the exterminator point's out another place then hand's you another invoice for his visit. Limiting places where mice can enter is possible but total elimination is next to impossible because mice easily go through holes you can't insert your pinky. You can buy pet safe bait stations at farm stores. If you don't see droppings and chewed material don't overlook possibility of hibernating bats or insects being source of noise. You can thank me with chocolates for that last bit of info.

If he was stupid enough to leave the comfort of carpet in air conditioned space for the attic,I seriously doubt he's clever enough to capture a mouse. On the other hand he might be good at keeping kangaroos and rhinos out of the place,my dog is.

the Intruder "Better mouse trap" comes through again. I put a couple more of these out on the open above where the noises were hoping the beast would come out from under the insulation and find them. I didn't hear any of the traps go off but the noises stopped. I went to the attic to put Xmas stuff away and there was a furry mess in one of the traps.

Success! these things work great. The Intruder

Patience and perseverance win's again. Glad to hear the positive report and I'll take a look at The Intruder.

An honest exterminator will tell you to set traps but if he is a good person he might tell you what kind and where to put them.

I bought every mouse trap I could find in stores and on the internet and put them all in two empty kitchen drawers where mice had been active.

Only one trap caught a mouse so I bought more of them and caught 27 mice in a week. Several of my friends and relatives have had the same kind of success. By the time you know you have a mouse problem there are usually dozens of them.

The only trap that worked was not an inexpensive Victor trap or the expensive one that shoots a rubber ring, it was an Ortho Home Defense Max Press 'N Set Mouse Trap that costs about $4 for 2 at Home Depot. TOMCAT makes the same thing. Buy at least a dozen of them.

Peanut butter works fine but trap placement is critical. Don't worry about where they nest, it is often outside underground and they come inside looking for food when the weather gets cold. Look for their path to the food. They like to scamper behind objects along baseboards, kickboards and backsplashes in the dark. Put some things on the kitchen counter 6" from the wall, put the traps in that space with the jaws facing the wall, then turn off the lights and go far away.

Keep resetting the traps for a week until the little ones finally get caught. This is not a task for the faint of heart, get mad if necessary.

A more difficult problem is rat infestation. You will know they are not mice when you find pieces of chewed rug and dishwasher hose on the floor.

Our neighbor was in the habit of putting garbage in their compost pile so eventually there were enough rats that three came to our house and destroyed our dishwasher and a rug. They are much smarter than mice so an exterminator told us to put the larger traps in the ceiling of the basement where they run. He used the big Victor traps and I added some Ortho/Tomcat traps. My traps caught all 3 rats on the first night. He asked me to come with him on his next job but I don't think he was serious. Fortunately we caught them before they multiplied. I still keep several of each kind of trap in place.

Happy hunting!

JDS,your suggestions should prove helpful to most homeowners. That trap is a good choice over all. As I stated earlier,Victors can be difficult to set without getting fingers pinched. They can also become rusty or gummed up so they don't trip well. I tune mine and will stick with Victor. I have similar opinions about rat traps. I prefer a 110 conibear trap for rats but don't reccomend it to most people. Same as a tuned Victor mouser,a tuned conibear is more effecent but are prone to accidently tripping while setting. If a conibear snap's it will put a world of hurt on you. An up side to conibear is it only catches dead rats,cats to for that matter so be carful.