Still another mouse thread!

[Ardie/WI]

We have been dealing with mice all summer in the house. The neighbors too and we all feel that it because of the drought.

We've been catching them at a rate of about one a day and it's usually in the back room, the oldest part of the house.

Caulking has become our best friend! Roger has caulked every place that he could think of, crawling around on the floor with a flash light.

My question is what size crack is too small for a mouse to get through? These are small/young mice.

[Ozarks Tom]

Mice don't have bones as we'd think of them, they're skeletons are a gristle like material. Consequently, they can squeeze through some really small places. You might try stuffing some steel wool into the holes/cracks and then caulking. They won't chew steel wool.

[Bearfootfarm]

My question is what size crack is too small for a mouse to get through?

I've seen them run through 1/2" hardware cloth without slowing down, so I'd say anything over 1/4" is too big

[meanwhile]

I do not think the calk will keep them out. My sons work doing Property Care Taking and the rats/mice in this area have been terrible this year. At one home they had to set out bait for four months before it was under control. They had to use a mix of baits. Some was the regular type Dcon but they also used the solid chunks of the Tom Cat brand. Not sure why one mouse would eat Dcon but the next one would not.

Good luck - it is frustrating.

[starjj]

i have seen then go through a hole the size of a dime

[wogglebug]

I've seen one go under a door where the gap was less than a half inch - more like a centimetre (0.4"). Barely slowed - hit, wriggle, and off and gone. This was an adult mouse, and well-fed or pregnant. Juveniles would do a lot "better".

There is a pressurised caulking compound rodents won't chew because it has embedded metal - I can't remember the name off-hand.

[Forlane]

Full grown mice will fit through a whole smaller than the thickness of your pinkie finger tip.

Takes about 50 days until breeding age with another 20 for pregnancy. That is 5 litters a year with each litter being between 5-10 mice.

If only 3 mice survive each litter to reproduce we're talking 240+ mice in one year.

Basically as an invasive species if you kill 70% of the population you will ONLY maintain current population numbers. Working at ACE hardware in the Lawn and Garden department in a farming town we get at least 1 customer per day that has had to have the wiring on their car repaired due to Mice/Rat problems. ($1k-$2.5k)

[ErinP]

Get peppermint oil (at health supplement stores) and a cheap little spray bottle. Spritz anywhere you think they might be getting in. It'll keep them out because the smell is overpowering to them
I've used this to keep mice (and packrats!) out for years...

[poppy]

1/4 inch will keep out adults. They can flatten their heads out and get through anything larger. Like coons and many other animals, if they get their head through, they have it made. An adult coon can go through a hole you wouldn't believe.

[Paquebot]

Here it has been wood mice or deer mice which suddenly showed up about a month ago. A few show up every winter but it's been years since I've seen a regular house mouse. They can't get into the house but in the garden shed and garage. For a week or so, 4 traps set and there'd be at least 2 mice every morning. None were active breeders and no young. All were merely adults and in almost every color phase available.

Martin

[Chief Cook]

I didn't know that there was a hole too small for a mouse to get through. We keep bar bait out all the time and add to it in the attic in the fall. We haven't had as much trouble with them in the house this year. The outside of the shop and in the barn are horrible this year. Our big F150 took a big hit. The check engine light stayed on and when DH opened the hood there was a nasty, smelly rats nest. Talk about yucko. He cleaned it out and checked my Fusion. She had been left out overnight while DH worked on my DF's truck in the shop. Sure enough there was another nest. Luckily they had not done any damage to the Fusion. So DF's truck got finished and my baby got parked inside where she belongs. We took the F150 to the car wash to power wash the dirt out from under it so he could work on it. A RAT ran out from under the front end!!! Of course it hid right under the machine where you change the settings and add money. I'm tellin you if that rat had gotten on me I would have torn that whole carwash apart. So now we are taking precautions like moving the truck around every other night. We tried throwing moth balls under them, but it didn't help. I wish you the best of luck and hope you get a handle on them soon.