Tripod member Caramba asks:
HELP! We have a mouse problem in our basement! We have set out two types of traps — the regular snap trap with peanut butter on it, and the tin box live trap. We got three mice already, but now the mice are eating the peanut butter and not setting off the traps! The live traps don't seem to be working. It has been two weeks now and I am terrified of them! What else can we do to get the critters out?

Handy Girl Bernadette suggests:
After seeing those tiny critters close up. it is amazing that they can instill such fear in the hearts of so many. All I know is that days — weeks even — after we cleared them from our home, we still found ourselves tip-toeing around, oh so creeped out. What we found in our process of elimination was that the world really is in need of a better mousetrap.

The first snap traps we bought had absolutely no kill. We witnessed one going off and, rather than snapping the mouse, it came down on him like a marshmallow. Next we tried the glue traps. These caught a gecko and a large stink bug, but no mice. Losing the stink bug we didn't mind, but we prefer to keep the geckos around — they take care of so many bugs. We just happened upon our next trap — the garbage can. My husband heard some scuffling in the kitchen, and realizing the situation he quickly put the giant cutting board on top of the can. The next morning we gave that little bugger a hefty drink with the garden hose, if you know what I mean. Standing guard at the garbage can 24/7 isn't really an option for most people, however. Days into our hunt and our efforts were less than efficacious.

At the hardware store we did find a snap trap that snapped with a bit more oomph than the grocery store variety, but by this time it was too late. It seemed the mice had learned to stay away from the traps — nothing we put on there enticed them. We even tried cuisine-theme nights — Tex-Mex, Italian, Chinese — all to no avail.

So we decided we had learn to think like a mouse. Realizing that these guys can crawl in a hole that is smaller than a quarter, we eyed all possible entries. We sealed off as many as we could find. While days later we still found evidence of the critters, we felt that it would be a help in preventing future raids.

Back at the hardware store we eyed the poisons. As we have a youngun' at home we really hesitated on this one. But we felt at such a loss. We tossed them up in the attic and just a couple days later all evidence of the critters was gone. There are many problems with poison: If you have any pets or children around, you certainly don't want to place it in a spot where they will get it. If you plan on having any remodeling done or electrical work (or any other work that will have contractors crawling around your house), you should really think twice about placing poison. If, however, you are at a complete loss for ridding your house of the rodents, and you've tried every other approach, sometimes you've just got to do it.

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