We are thinking that Mus Musculus has finally met its match. For the last 4 years we have trapped these buggers in the attic of the house, encouraged feral cats, protected the snakes (other than rattlesnakes), called for reinforcements from the coyotes, but to little avail.
This new house is insulated on the underside of the metal roof, so that makes the ceiling sheetrock bare of insulation. In earlier construction methods, insulation laid directly on the ceiling sheetrock. Mice are always in the attics of houses---its good for winter quarters and provides good places to store food. Only problem is, with a bare ceiling, mice running on the ceiling sheetrock make quite a noise. But, they must go back outside to get water---how often they need to go for water is unknown to us.
Well, we did the usual of plugging every hole larger than a wooden pencil through which they might crawl to get access to the attic. I theorize they can detect a hole that may well lead to access by the slight draft that might be going into the hole or out of the hole. Nonetheless, all holes plugged---even the weep holes in the stone veneer. Another likely access point is from the garage attic, then through the breezeway attic, then into the house attic.
Over the last 4 years, about 50 mice have been trapped in the attic with good old victor mouse traps---the other kind are not as effective. Even more have been trapped in the garage, on the floor.
More recently, even holes with more remote chances of entry have been plugged---for example, the electrical service boxes, bolted to the stonework of the garage might well have holes through the stone with access around the wires large enough for them to enter the garage wall, then up the inside of the wall (garage interior is sheetrocked) then into the garage attic, then across the breezeway attic and then into the house attic.
Now mind you, all known holes between the garage attic and the breezeway, and between the breezeway and the house attic have been plugged. Another key point about the strategy was to prevent them from entering the garage attic.
So that leaves no hole into the house attic unplugged------and, we were confident we had finally won the war -----until we found two more mice in the house attic traps last week.
So, determined to find the access, we placed a trap in the garage attic, near the wall into the breezeway attic, just on some horizontal surface. Bingo, got mouse---but it should not have been there as one of the strategies was to prevent mice from going into the garage attic, knowing that it was difficult to be sure that the garage attic was isolated from the house attic. Lots of wires go between the garage attic and the house attic.
But, the mice must still be getting into the garage attic---tightened up some of the plugs that were already in place---that was three days ago, and since then, no pitty pat on the ceiling all during the night----Maybe, just maybe we have won this battle.
Clever little devils.
This new house is insulated on the underside of the metal roof, so that makes the ceiling sheetrock bare of insulation. In earlier construction methods, insulation laid directly on the ceiling sheetrock. Mice are always in the attics of houses---its good for winter quarters and provides good places to store food. Only problem is, with a bare ceiling, mice running on the ceiling sheetrock make quite a noise. But, they must go back outside to get water---how often they need to go for water is unknown to us.
Well, we did the usual of plugging every hole larger than a wooden pencil through which they might crawl to get access to the attic. I theorize they can detect a hole that may well lead to access by the slight draft that might be going into the hole or out of the hole. Nonetheless, all holes plugged---even the weep holes in the stone veneer. Another likely access point is from the garage attic, then through the breezeway attic, then into the house attic.
Over the last 4 years, about 50 mice have been trapped in the attic with good old victor mouse traps---the other kind are not as effective. Even more have been trapped in the garage, on the floor.
More recently, even holes with more remote chances of entry have been plugged---for example, the electrical service boxes, bolted to the stonework of the garage might well have holes through the stone with access around the wires large enough for them to enter the garage wall, then up the inside of the wall (garage interior is sheetrocked) then into the garage attic, then across the breezeway attic and then into the house attic.
Now mind you, all known holes between the garage attic and the breezeway, and between the breezeway and the house attic have been plugged. Another key point about the strategy was to prevent them from entering the garage attic.
So that leaves no hole into the house attic unplugged------and, we were confident we had finally won the war -----until we found two more mice in the house attic traps last week.
So, determined to find the access, we placed a trap in the garage attic, near the wall into the breezeway attic, just on some horizontal surface. Bingo, got mouse---but it should not have been there as one of the strategies was to prevent mice from going into the garage attic, knowing that it was difficult to be sure that the garage attic was isolated from the house attic. Lots of wires go between the garage attic and the house attic.
But, the mice must still be getting into the garage attic---tightened up some of the plugs that were already in place---that was three days ago, and since then, no pitty pat on the ceiling all during the night----Maybe, just maybe we have won this battle.
Clever little devils.
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