Cycling UK Forum

We had mice last spring and I poison one but the other two I caught alive. Mrs Mike made me take them over the park and release them into the wild. There were other houses close by so I hope they found a new home.

Mice are not a rarity and they are a pest no matter how much they have ahhhhhhh factor.

When I used to get them at the old house I would try to catch them by a humane trap, then relocate them, usually on my journey to work, quite what they thought of the descent down Fox Holes Lane off Winter Hill in a bike bar bag is anybody's guess!

They should be relocated over a mile away else they will find their way back, I felt this way at least they had a chance of being back in the food chain, perhaps brekkie for some grateful Owl.

Adrian, those pics of the hornets are superb!

Im hoping you dont mind if I print these off for work? (Science technician at a college) for our GCSE and GCE students.


Mary

Hello Mary and thank you, of course I don't mind you printing them for that but not sure what the quality will be like, I've never tried printing them myself, if they don't come out well pm me and I'll try and send you a larger copy ............. if I can find which hard drive/DVD's the originals are on that is

Adrian

Last year we visited a local up market country bistro. I sat in the corner with my back to an ornamental bread oven which was stacked with logs. Part way through our meal my wife pointed out the baby rat (it's eyes still closed) which was standing on the edge of the bread oven inches from my shoulder. I called over the waiter but the rat disappeared into the logs before he could see it.
Minutes later I heard squeaks from the floor beneath our table, looking under the table I saw four or five baby rats in a small alcove in the wall. I called over the waiter and we moved tables.The rats were duly swept into a cardboard box and removed.
The head waiter was of foreign origin, possibly Italian or Greek. His state of panic and broken English put us in mind of Faulty Towers and the Siberian Hamster sketch.
The food was pretty average and quite pricey but the impromptu cabaret was priceless.

Mice??? Get rid of the little things as soon as you can or you'll be overrun. I had them in the garage one winter and they did loads of damage. They don't look so cute when they've chewed through something expensive. Use in-humane traps (the classic spring traps) and remove any food supply.

(Edited for bad language with ***'s in. I don't like it. Sorry for editing it out, but it does annoy me. From now on, I'll be trying to keep ahead of it. Sorry Mister W, I'm not singling you out.
Regards, Mick F.)

I put out nuts etc for the birds and I realised that storing them in the garage was attracting mice. I bought a couple of large swing-lid waste bins. Next news they had gnawed a small round hole in the lid. I transferred my birdfood to a much more robust municipal wheelie bin, which has been rodent free for several years.

At the same time as the hole-in-the-bin-gang robbery, I set two of the tilt-up trap-door traps, baited with peanuts, since that was what they had been coming for. One of the traps was successful twice - on consecutive nights. The mice were released in a field on the far side of the M 621 and A62. None seen since and no reports of rodents playing chicken on the motorway. No signs of any nests in my garage, although they had gnawed through a couple of pairs of decent cycling gloves. The had also gnawed all the way round both faces of my son's hide mallet, so they must have been hungry. It turned out that the nests were under a long-term pile of building debris in next-door's garden.

Had some in the garage earlier this year , they went upstairs into the store room and chewed through a ski bag and some other stuff. Problem solved by cutting a hole in the side door so the cat can get in and out.

eileithyia wrote:They should be relocated over a mile away else they will find their way back.

I realised last week that a mouse or mice had been coming up through a gap next to the rising water main under the kitchen sink, presumably to check out the contents of the bin. I set a 'humane' trap, baited with some peanuts and caught one within a few minutes. I relocated the trespasser about a mile away, on the far side of the roadworks for the new J 27 of the M 62. The following morning on the way for my paper I saw a dead mouse at the top of the street headed in the general direction of my house. Couldn't be mine.... could it?

Anyway, that one was a loner or the others got the message. SWMBO is still in hospital, blissfully unaware of all this. (I know it sounds bad, but the place has not degenerated into a tip while she has been away )

My lodgers have departed, at least I think they have unless they have borrowed some tools and knocked up a leanto under the bench I didn't really want to evict them so I'm glad theve gone under their own steam.

Peter Rowell wrote:The mouse and rat traps were perfected around 50 years ago with the "self-set" trap. Easy to set, worked on the principle that rodents gnaw upwards with their bottom teeth. Never known them to fail.

So where are they now, modern traps are difficult to set and very unreliable. I have four traps that I've modified and they again are very reliable. I use a cycle spoke as the "trigger", it goes in a loop round the bait and the mouse has to push against it to get to the bait. That move is fatal for the mouse.

You can still get them.....I got two yesterday !
The little nippers ( the plastic ready baited ones) are not good over time, I find they injure rather than kill.
So back to the traditional ones.
We also have a sonic device that helps keep the blighters away...........but if they do come in ( the deaf ones) we have a few strategic traps and a useless cat that preffers catching baby rabits.

We used to use humain traps & then put the mice out for the cat. When the cat got older & slower, we used to shake the mice up a bit first to slow them down too! Most of them still got away though.

Now we just trap them, especially in the house.

Problem last year was one got into our rack bag & tried to take all the lining and padding for nesting material. Not nice...