When we moved in to this house three years ago we made the ominous discovery of a box of mouse poison under the sink. However, we’ve never had a problem in all that time until a week ago, when we discovered a little hole in a loaf of bread with a small mousy snack removed from one crust. It became clear that they were coming in through one shelf of one of our cupboards and the problem seemed to be truly confined to just that shelf. We removed all the food from that shelf and kept the door to the cabinet closed whenever it wasn’t in use but we’ve still had a turd or two in there every morning despite the lack of food.
Ian went to the pet shop today to get a catch-and-release mouse trap. He had to visit three pet shops to find one with any in stock; it seems that this is mouse season (one shop has sold 50 this week). We set it up this afternoon and waited.
Lo and behold, we heard a little snap from the kitchen this evening, so we crept into the kitchen and cautiously opened the cupboard to find a gorgeous little brown mouse in our trap, sitting so perfectly still that I was afraid he had been hurt.
He hadn’t, though, and we brought the trap out for a better look. It seemed obvious that the poor little guy was feeling very stressed, so Ian took him to the park straight away to release him. He got to keep the chunk of cheese for his trouble.
Lukie was very much looking forward to going along to the park to release anybody that we might catch tonight, so here’s hoping that we have another visitor after the hour that Ian is no longer prepared to go out, stressed mouse or not.
I guess this is one time I am glad to have our cat. Mice or pooping cat–which is worse? The mouse looked very cute–I’m surprised you didn’t keep it as a pet!