What bait to use in mousetraps?

[Mitch]

I've had no mouse activity this Fall/Winter, then all of the sudden within the last week there's poop everywhere.

I've put traps out. I have 2 kinds: spring traps, and the kind that squeeze the mouse until he suffocates (my favorite).

I baited them with peanut butter, and the little bastards lick them clean every night! I don't know how they do it. I've tested the traps and they all have hair triggers. They usually go off when I'm just setting them down.

What should I bait them with that will cause the little pricks to have to work at it?

[HeyBub]

Think cat.

[Mitch]

Had one. Didn't work out.

[Mitch]

Why is that? Can they smell their dead brethren?

[Mitch]

I'm using these:

These are good because if my toddler puts his finger in it, it won't hurt. These have worked great for me in the past. It closes on the mouse's upper body and squeezes until he can't breathe anymore.

It's fun to watch, too.

I'm glad I used these, because I see already one of the kids decided to help out by sticking a Cheerio in the PB.

The other kind looks like this, but it's a spring trap. I have these in the nooks and crannies where my kids won't get at them.

The glue traps are 100%, but my wife freaks out when she hears the mouse shrieking in his death throes.

[dicko]

I like these too. They're also available at any Walgreens drugstore.

I use crunchy peanut butter as bait, and I spread it on the underside of the top of trap, not the trigger paddle.

-dickm

[Norminn]

Behind or under kitchen range or fridge is a good place to put traps so's kids and pets cannot reach them. These areas also favored by mice, in my experience.

[Mitch]

Yeah, that's how they get access to the whole kitchen. They go up through the range and come out through the vents.

[Edwin Pawlowski]

Did you read the post?

[Steve]

I swear by this method! We have a summer getaway out in the boonies and there's usually no shortage of the little sob's there. The problem with individual traps is when they go off with or without a victim, its useless until reset. These dunk buckets work until the heard either wises up (hasn't happened yet) or decimates (yes!)... The buckets tend to get a little stinky if you don't clean them out every couple days but other than that they just plain work beautifully! when I first tried one after one night I had at least a dozen drownings by morning. I put one inside our shack. I have another outside. Now I have usually been lucky to get a couple in the outside bucket and it's been rare to get even one inside. Try it!

Steve

[cavedweller]

I'd rather have a smelly few in a pail than a smelly couple in spring traps or worse, "somewhere" in the house after expiring from eating poisoned bait. Disposal outside in a patch of bush is easy and there's no danger that scavengers will consume any remnants of the poison. I've actually heard my setup go off in the night and checked to find a swimmer.

[HeyBub]

Get two cats.

[Oren]

Former prison cats work great; as far as I can tell.

Any local prison will donate cats, if nothing else but to get them out of the dumpster life.

[Oren]

I recall traps being used in consecutive order. Blood or not.

How does the mouse know?

[SteveB]

I have seen mouse traps that were twenty years old.

Don't re-use traps?

Piffle.

Steve

[Doug Miller]

They do have noses, you know...

[Doug Miller]

So is soap. Wash your hands after handling a mousetrap, dummy.

[mm]

I'm sure there is truth to the "don't reuse" but at the same time, I've reused successfully. What I end up doing after I've gotten frustrated is setting new traps but using the old traps too. But I'm sure I've gotten consecutive mouses in the same trap.

[hallerb]

I use a live trap emptied at least twice a day,

I release them to the outdoors where they belong.

frankly i prefer to not kill anything unnecessarily.......

since something out there will kill me someday:(

I sealed the house well and dont keep a food source around. my big mistake was the 50 pound sack of sunflower seeds............

with a plentiful food source, nice cozy house and one pregnant mouse.

over 40 went out in the live trap/ a few old geezers did die, probably from old age and fear.. they were very grey like a old person.

dont kill them just relocate.

[Doug Miller]

That's why you should use raisins instead. They can't lick them off, and when they try to tug them off -- whack!