A few months ago we noticed that we seemed to have won a friend in the form of a mouse. Was it a boy one or girl one or even a non-binary one? I have no idea and less interest.
The little fellow started showing up at the same time every evening and scratted about in the same three locations sub floor and would only leave if I thumped the floor above where it was scratting and scratching. There was absolutely no indication of surface activity and no way it could get to surface so it just seems to roll up every evening for, with no thumping on my part, about thirty minutes then goes. Oh, and all airbricks are ‘guarded’ with cut-out, pound store flour sieves so where it comes and goes to I have no idea – the neighbours?
No big deal, but over time it isn’t going to do the joists any good as it’s always the same three locations and it’s a given that eventually the electrics will be hit.
With no way to get poison down there, we being parquet wood tiles throughout with ceramic floor jobbies in the kitchen, I wondered wot to do. Wot to do was I got was one of they plug-in rodent repellers. What can I lose? Twenty pounds, right? Let’s switch to positive mode; nothing ventured, nothing gained.
Anyhoo, I got it home, plugged it in and then read the instructions. As you do. Does not penetrate walls, ceilings or floors. Damn! Good start. Rather than return it, I glued it into a one socket short extension so’s it’s on the deck and secreted it behind the TV very close to the first point of call of the little guy.
If you’re interested, there is one out there that’s as good as half price and advertises itself as a whole house repellent. To be fair to the seller, they appear to make available all the negative comments on this kit along with the positive.
Long story short, if you have a scratchy pal and try one of these electro repellents rather than poison or traps, be patient as it’s not an instant cure. Over a two and a bit week period the length of stay of each visit reduced, firstly slowly and then more quickly, from many minutes to many seconds to one scratch and gone and finally, for the past many evenings, nothing.
As sceptical as I was, all I can say is that after three weeks, peace has returned to the house as it seems my irritating little pest has finally got the ‘silent noisy’ message and has left. Now, if I could just get rid of that damn mouse...
To close, how can you have a post about mice and not take a trip down memory lane?
Quote; Robin McKinley.
“Mice are terribly chatty. They will chat about anything, and if there is nothing to chat about, they will chat about having nothing to chat about. Compared to mice, robins are reserved.”
No comments:
Post a Comment