Ice the mice...

And then there were mice. Of all the rodent pests that visit the garden I like them least. Sure they’re cute, adorable even. They rarely do damage to the plants. But they’re the only ones that want to live with me.

So I kill them.

They can live anywhere else they want. In the garden. In the woods. Even in the garage. They can not live in my cottage.

Yet of all the choice locations for them to set down roots, have dinner, and raise their beady-eyed little families, they choose my kitchen. This, by extension, puts them anywhere in my house their tiny feet can carry them.

That, as I occasionally tell my children when they misfire in the responsibility department; is a bad decision.

There’s no sense being coy or delicate about it. When they come in, I go off. I started by trapping. Snap traps—not tiny little Havaharts. If they make it to my kitchen, they don’t get a second chance.

When that failed to stem the tide, I brought in poison baits. The only problem with these silent killers is that you don’t know if you’re being successful.

The current mouse-sle defense system is a combination of the two…along with a continuing effort to find and plug potential entry sites, that started when I moved in here two years ago.

Rising body counts in the traps tell me several things. One: the physical barrier measures aren’t working, or haven’t accounted for all the points of entry. Two: the poison baits, despite being successful to some unknown degree, aren’t enough. Three: just like me, mice find peanut butter irresistible.

I don’t like killing anything.

But I’m pretty picky about my roommates.

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Copyright  2006- 2007 by Carlo A. Balistrieri.
All rights reserved.