<p>“Juiced up” mice? I know what a little espresso does for me, I can only imagine what it does to a little rodent.</p>
<p>I would suggest you see if that caroler is still being sold and buy one to replace it! Or if retired, took for a replacement on Ebay. </p>
<p>Just kidding. That is just what I would have to do. My mom collects and gives things like that, and I would cringe to have to tell her it was eaten by a mouse. She wouldn’t understand. She would expect me to have kept it in a “vault.” (wink)</p>
<p>lol, sunnyflorida. She could get some helpful cc’er from Philly to drive up to the factory and see if they could get one at the factory store!!! (D2’s g.s. group did a “field trip” to the Byers Choice factory eons ago (Montgomeryville or nearby?)…very interesting, but I already have a ridiculously huge Santa collection; couldn’t get started with another “collectible”. But if any of those little creeps got into my Santa boxes, there’d be h*** to pay for the little creep. The mental picture of mice scurrying around in triple-time after ingesting the espresso is quite entertaining, actually!!!</p>
<p>Thanks Sunny and Astro - Believe me, I’m thinking about it!</p>
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<p>Wow, just wow.</p>
<p>We’re up to four now. Two in glue traps- they really didn’t seem too distressed, we used the kind with anesthetic, face down in the glue, nuff said. One caught by the dog, and one paralyzed from the waist down by our cat. That poor little guy did get my sympathy. She was just standing over him so proudly, as he dragged his hind legs behind him. I scooped him into a small box and double bagged him, I just didn’t have the guts to end his misery any faster. I hope we’ve got the upper hand now. I’m not seeing new droppings and the scratching sound behind the oven is gone. Our dog was going nuts over them and she’s a lot calmer now.</p>
<p>About nibbling wires – my brother had three white laboratory mice when he was at that rodent age, maybe twelve. One morning I went to brush my teeth with the the electric toothbrush. The wires had been chewed through and I got a nasty shock. And then a second! The mice, Tom, Dick and Harry, were sitting on the counter grinning at me. Last time I ever used an electric toothbrush. I was fourteen.</p>
<p>Sorry about the in-law problem. Why not sew the lamplighter a new costume?</p>
<p>Cat…</p>
<p>Oh, I’ve got two cats and they don’t give a rat’s behind about chasing rodents!</p>
<p>This rat is a whopper:</p>
<p>[Giant</a> rat found in ‘lost world’](<a href=“http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/asiapcf/12/17/giant.rat.ap/index.html]Giant”>http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/asiapcf/12/17/giant.rat.ap/index.html)</p>
<p>sorry, BB. Can’t remotely make myself click on a link that has the words “Giant” and “Rat” used together in the same sentence. Nope. Not gonna do it. YUK!</p>
<p>Oh, it’s kind of cute as long as it stays in Indonesia.</p>
<p>“The giant rat is about five times the size of a typical city rat”</p>
<p>It looks pretty fat, dumb and lazy in the photo–not at all like a city rat.</p>
<p>That’s what I thought too–more like a tropical lounge lizard rat than a nasty back alley rat.</p>
<p>I actually have a pest control person that comes to our house four times a year. They have some kind of bait that the mice eat. It makes them go in search of water. When they drink, they have a heart attack and die. Unless your car has a source of water, you might be able to use it, but you might have to call a pest control person to find out how to get some.
Those sticky traps are disgusting! My sister used one and the poor mouse lived for a long time in the trash! EEEWW!!</p>
<p>Apparently, rats can be put to a good use :):</p>
<p>[New weapon against land mines](<a href=“http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/cgi-bin/PrintStory.pl?document_id=2003712156&slug=rats18m&date=20070518”>http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/cgi-bin/PrintStory.pl?document_id=2003712156&slug=rats18m&date=20070518</a>)</p>
<p>^^No explosions, just some pictures of the creature which is kind of… cute.</p>
<p>Sarasmom, I totally agree: glue traps are gross! But with bait, one has to be careful to keep it away from pets. Electrocuting traps, in my view, are the least gross-out method, but they do not work outdoors (and I learned not to put loose bait in them - my dog learned to shake it out of the trap)</p>
<p>We thought about the glue trap and then realized we’d be dealing with the dog or cat’s face stuck to the glue trap which was stuck to the dying mouse…don’t want to go there
PS Can you imagine that Indonesian guy holding that rat in his arms!!EEEKKK!</p>
<p>^^woody, LOL! I choked on my morning coffee laughing when I imagined a stuck cat!</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/29/nyregion/29rats.html?th&emc=th[/url]”>http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/29/nyregion/29rats.html?th&emc=th</a></p>
<p>I’m trying to figure out if I should put the mouse poison in the car or in the garage. I believe I’ve solved the immediate problem.</p>
<p>OP – Mice travel in packs and breed quickly. If I were in your position, I would call an exterminator. They can make recommendations on attempting to mouse-proof your garage or they can provide this service themselves. </p>
<p>I have a contract with an extermination company, and they come regularly to bait traps. I had a mouse-proofing done last year, and I am very happy with the results. I still have them come to do other things, but also to bait the barn and the generator. They did big-time damage to the generator a few years ago. They moved in during a long power outage during the winter (it was warm), and chewed the wires.</p>
<p>Oh, thanks for the word about the generator because we are just getting a new one.</p>