I use old fashioned mouse traps...the spring loaded type. I figure they enjoy a final meal and they operate so quickly, the mouse doesn't know what hit him. I hate the whole thing though...I don't like killing anything.

We had a mouse get caught in a Victor trap under the sink. I think it caught the leg or something, and poor thing was undr there till DH got home. He dispatched the mouse, then joined me and the kids at the diner for dinner. I’d I’d been planning to use the crock-pot but just couldn’t, with the mouse under there.

We had some, 3M maybe, that supposedly the mouse goes inside and is instantly killed, then you throw out the whole thing. Well, once or twice the mouse chewed its way out through the plastic shell.

I just don’t’now if there is a foolproof method, once they get in the house.

We use snap traps ... though most need to be adjusted in order to have adequate sensitivity unless you have really clumsy mice. If they're not sensitive enough, it's not that they injure the mouse, they just don't catch anything (usually emptied without springing). We use peanut butter, since it can't just fall off the trigger plate. It's also something they can't just snatch, so it keeps them in the right spot to be killed instantly ... they'll either die or escape without injury.

I'll admit we usually wait at least a few hours after we hear a trap snap, but it's more that we'd like the mouse to be obviously dead (as in in rigor) when we clean up the trap (it's dead ... we just want it to look dead, too).

Glue traps are truly awful ... there were some left over under some of the racks at one of my former workplaces ... the mice scream and move, and it's awful to hear and worse to fish out from underneath something to clean up ... (I'm not sure how I drew the short straw ... I'm not sure everyone could hear them.) I haven't had any horrible experiences with snap traps, just the typical 'ugh, there's a sprung trap to clean up.'

I bought some glue traps once, and after reading the package more closely I took them back! Yikes!

Whatever sort of traps you use, if you have a lot of mice they will become wise to them and you will have to switch it up. We live in a wooded area and one year the mice were relentless. We used the wooden snap traps, then when the mice stopped getting in those we used glue traps. They are harsh so it is important that you kill the mouse quickly when it gets on the glue trap so it does not suffer. I leave that to SO. They stopped getting in the glue traps, we used the gator traps.

Gator traps are easier to deal with than the traditional snap trap.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01MZ19B3O/ref=syn_sd_onsite_desktop_179?psc=1&pd_rd_w=8D8FC&spLa=ZW5jcnlwdGVkUXVhbGlmaWVyPUExREJPWjQ1T0U5SU9WJmVuY3J5cHRlZElkPUEwOTU3NTY1MVE3Rk1TWEYyVkRRTCZlbmNyeXB0ZWRBZElkPUEwNDg1MTEyM1ZPNkNZTUcxR0xMWiZ3aWRnZXROYW1lPXNkX29uc2l0ZV9kZXNrdG9wJmFjdGlvbj1jbGlja1JlZGlyZWN0JmRvTm90TG9nQ2xpY2s9dHJ1ZQ==

I recently had to call a professional pest control company for what I thought was 1 big rat in my attic. He got out 21. Not mice. RATS. 21 RATS......IN MY ATTIC!

He used huge snap traps, baited with peanut butter, and then put poison out at the end just to be sure.

The glue traps are for sadists. Since I kept a little deer mouse as a pet for two years, I shiver to think of traps.

Poison is not a good practice for rodent control for a few reasons ...

1. They eat it and get out to where something can eat them, thus poisoning the entire food chain.

2. They eat it and run off somewhere to die in an unknown location, like in your wall, where you can't getto the stinky dead body.

3. They will transport the poison elsewhere ... you don't want a pet finding it, and you don't want to find it somewhere you didn't put it ...

I'm sure there are other reasons, but those are the main reasons that come to my mind.

amylou321, if you have that many rodents, what you really need is a professional who does pest exclusion. They will fogure out where and how they're getting in, plug up the holes, and then it's just a matter of catching what's in the house already and periodically rechecking for entry points. Being in a wooded area is not a reason for having rodents inside one's house ...

I use a professional pest control company. Or have anyway, when we have an issue. If its just a mouse or two then we can take care of it ourselves. The man I use uses poison that does not have a second kill. Its not the green tomcat stuff in dollar general. He uses it after all the other measures you spouted off as a precaution in case one slipped through.

Living in a wooded area and having lots of pets that have free access to food, as well as having a warm house for them to seek refuge in can make it an issue in the wintertime. A mouse only needs an opening that is 1/4 inch to get into your house. If you live in a solid concrete bunker with no way a 1/4 inch opening can be created or found than la dee dah for you. Also, I do not and would not fault the said professional for missing such a small opening which could be somewhere unseen or inaccessible to people the last time he was there. The rats in the attic apparently worked their way under my soffit to get in there. We managed to catch one of them on our blink cameras doing it. It made that whole length of soffit fall. Pests happen.

The best mousetrap I ever used is made by Intruder and is called The Better Mousetrap (LOL) An easy to use, very sensitive snap type trap.

i use an electronic one i got on A. works fine. a dab of pnb in it and a red light blinks when one is caught.

I've used the black plastic ones like Amylou posted. Much easier to set.

I'm still okay setting the Victor snap traps -- but they can be tricky. Thank you everyone for being humane and respectful of mother nature. We haven't had our normal Fall mouse invasion in two years ... fingers crossed we've closed off enough of their ways in to the house!

Ya can't build a better mousetrap. They are what they are. Cheap wood or the fancy black plastic..they work accordingly to how the mouse approaches them. When the bar snaps and gets a clean kill--it seems more humane. When they get caught by one leg, live to chew and claw their way across the floor..not so much. Bottom line you aren't in control of how that will turn out. If it helps, nature is no picnic. Outside they may freeze/starve/get snatched by a cat or larger bird.... In the end Nature is hands on more cruel than anything you will buy.

If you set a Victor trap between two objects, so that the mouse has to approach it from the front instead of the sides, does that help the trap dispatch the mouse better?

I thought you were supposed to put them with bait side facing a wall, since that is how they run, along the wall/baseboard. I've never had one trapped by a leg. Recently had two of them in the house, one in each bathroom, under the sink. I don't know how they got in. Two access areas, have pieces of copper scrub pad still in those holes that I plugged up after I found them. One near the garage's outer door and the other near the garage/kitchen door. I'll have to look around the house again.

"If you set a Victor trap between two objects, so that the mouse has to approach it from the front instead of the sides, does that help the trap dispatch the mouse better?"

In theory, but there's no guarantee that the trap will spring with the first touch, or that the mouse will approach with nose first. I use the Victor snap traps - they don't always provide a quick kill, but nothing is guaranteed to do that.....I just figure that they're as likely, if not moreso, to do that than others. They're also so inexpensive that I don't mind tossing them if they've sprung without a catch.

I also use the wooded snap traps but I use a bait that they can't seem to resist (pic below). One mouse was caught with a trap that was baited 2 years ago so it doesn't appear to go bad over time. Just one drop of this bait is all it takes...

We use the black plastic traps, baited with PB and placed near a wall. They work great and I don't recall ever catching one by a leg.

There are poisons and there are baits, baits need not to be poisonous, just attractants.

a red light blinks when one is caught.

or maybe it's the green light that blinks for a dead mouse and the red light blinks for a dead battery...

Steph, yes yes, latter.

vgkg, good to know that Tomcat bait works.

Thanks everyone for your suggestions, and also for being good citizens of the planet and not using glue or toxins. Thanks too, mdln, for position the Owl information. I may print some of these out and post them to a few country store bulletin boards.

Here are some interesting and helpful videos. The one about the electronic mouse trap is helpful because he points out a mistake that people make. And there’s a couple more people that are really good and humane trapping and disposing of the mice.

The Blue Jays are amazing they are so aggressive they want to devour the mouse corpse. I want to save them for my possum, but I haven’t seen any of them for three or four weeks now. I hope they didn’t get done in by a possum or a car.

I think I will pick up a bunch of those simple standby victor wood and metal or plastic and metal mouse traps. Is one of you pointed out, these are as likely as any to give a clean dispatch.

We once had a southern flying squirrel in our cellar but apparently came in through the chimney. We love them but know that they could be so distracted and wanted to get him back outside ASAP. I think what we did is open one of the cellar windows and take the screen off, and like a bat he disappeared overnight through the opening. Relief. They are the most beautiful animals.

Victor electronic mouse traps - why they may not work

12,257 views • Sep 12, 2020 • In this video I explain why I needed to buy another mouse trap. Victor is one of the oldest companies in the business (since 1898). I compare my old trap to the “new and improved” version. I mention an important point about why this mouse trap may not work, and give a few tips on catching mice using mouse traps.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_5QEFfNv9jA

🪤🐭❗️Myths about baiting mouse and rat traps, what is true and what is not! - YouTube

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jAuwp3kLSQ8

🐭👀The three best ways to bait a mousetrap to get them almost every time ( no licked clean traps) - YouTube

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jAuwp3kLSQ8

This last one is really clever. The guy is very experienced about mice. I’m not sure that I want to take my little glue gun out but the idea of locking down a small piece of bait is a good one.

Years ago I rented the upstairs of a farmhouse, And my landlord and his family lived on the first floor. One morning they came to me and asked could they borrow my cat for a few minutes. There was a mouse in their large pantry and they thought my cat could help them out. They put her in the pantry and close the door and within just a few minutes we heard a few pots and pans clatter, then silence. My cat caught the mouse and when we opened the door, proudly pranced out with it.

@petalique, love your cat story!

Had one cat that helped mice escape from the humane trap, another who just ignored them, one who played with them, and only one who actually killed them. Need a better feline school system here..🐈

We use electronic traps. The mouse is quickly killed, they are easy to empty without having to touch a dead mouse. If you catch them alive, you have to take them a good two miles to release them, otherwise they come right back home. Since we only have a problem in the winter, I figure it's more humane to kill a mouse quickly than to cart it two miles away where it doesn't know the territory, has no nest and no stored food.

Had to dig out the mousetraps last night. Dd wanted Oreos for dessert. Went to pantry to get a new package and it had a hole chewed in the package, then inside, the mouse ate most of the Oreas. We knew we had one or more in the house because the cat was hanging out by the dishwasher waiting to ponce. She's a very good mouser, but is mostly retired now being in her sunset years.

Found the mousetraps. Baited them with Oreos, since now we know they love a good Oreo. Caught one in less than an hour, then another overnight. Set a few more traps just now (and what thread do I see when I tune in here change the subject in my head! This one!) in case there are any others still inside the house.

We normally use the old fashioned snap traps but couldn't find any last time we needed traps. I had buy something called Tom Kat traps. I would consider them as humane as a trap can be. It's quick and no lingering, if you know what I mean. I actually prefer these to the standard snap trap as baiting and setting it are easier. Not foolproof, but indeed easier.

I usually put the baited and set trap in a paper bag then throw out the whole bag and what's inside it when the deed is done. But I don't have any paper bags at the moment, so I put dh on trap disposal duty. It is too hard for me to see that, as I adore animals. Just not when they are chomping up my dishwasher innards or cupboards. Then I'm quickdraw with the traps. Good luck to all dealing with this. Here, we have tons of snow outside so their foods must be unavailable to them at this time. At least our mice had a good last meal of Oreos.

@SEA SEA

https://globalnews.ca/news/908250/how-do-lab-rats-eat-oreos-u-s-study-suggests-the-cookies-are-as-addictive-as-cocaine/
TORONTO – Lab rats may have the same appetite and eating habits as the average hungry consumer. In a new study, U.S. researchers say that the rodents prefer Oreos over rice cakes.
And how do the lab rats eat the iconic cookie? They break it open and eat the middle first. It’s yet another study that suggests sugary treats – in this case Oreos – are as addictive as cocaine.
At Connecticut College, Dr. Joseph Schroeder and his students tested a group of rats in two different tests. Within a maze, the rats were fed either Oreos or rice cakes. Other rats were also given an injection of cocaine or morphine or a saline solution as a control.
Turns out, the mice that were conditioned to the Oreos preferred to wait on the “drug” side of the maze as rats that were hooked on cocaine and morphine.
As for the rice cakes? “Just like humans, rats don’t seem to get much pleasure out of eating them,” Schroeder said.
“Our research supports the theory that high-fat/high-sugar foods stimulate the brain in the same way that drugs do,” Schroeder said in a statement.
“It may explain why some people can’t resist these foods despite the fact that they know they are bad for them.”
Eating Oreos even activated more neurons in the brain’s “pleasure centre” than the addictive drugs, Schroeder’s team found.
Following the study, Schroeder staved off Oreos. “I haven’t touched an Oreo since doing this experiment,” he told Today.com.
Earlier this year, Canadian researchers did their own research with Oreos and mice. In that case, University of Guelph scientists suggested that addiction to sugar is real after they found that mice would go for Oreos even after they had a full dinner.
“There appear to be several biological and psychological similarities between food addiction and drug dependence including craving and loss of control,” another study said.
The Connecticut research suggests that high fat, sugar-laden foods are more dangerous than drugs because they’re cheaper and easier to access.
Schroeder will present his findings next month at the Society for Neuroscience conference.
A spokesperson for Mondelez International, which owns Nasbico, says the company hasn’t heard from the researcher and has not yet seen the study. (Schroeder will present his findings next month at the Society for Neuroscience conference.)
“While it may seem simple to bucket foods as ‘good’ or ‘bad,’ the reality is that foods are complex, and encouraging people to enjoy a balanced diet paired with physical activity is most important,” the company told Global News in a statement.
“We would caution against interpreting any results as specific to Oreo cookies, since they appear to be used in this research as a proxy for a non-specific ‘sweet’ variable.”

Wow mdln. Isn't that some news there! I will say, after seeing how much Oreos the mice ate and how quickly too, I'd have to say Oreos are a better bait than peanut butter. What a study though! Makes one rethink buying a package a couple times a year for a treat. Might not be worth the risk after reading that article.