What's the best mousetrap?

Cat..)

Glue traps work very well, but they are extremely cruel.

The old spring traps work, and are usually a bit more humane.

I wouldn’t recommend rodent poison, especially if you have any pets in, or around your home.

I’ve seen plug in rodent repellent devices. They emit a sound that is designed to drive them away. If there is a wall outlet nearby, you could try one… Then it would leave on it’s own, instead of you having to find it dead, or kill it in a glue trap, or have it die in your walls…

I have no pets.

I will look for the plug in device, but I’m getting glue traps and the spring ones, too. I don’t care how it dies.

Carbon monoxide.

Victor Metal Pedal Snap trap or the Victor Easy Set Mouse Trap. I have done plenty of research on this subject. I was even published in one of the engineering trade magazines discussing this very subject.

Store the clean traps in a bag of bird seed for a day and they will be even more effective.

Don’t buy knock-off junk. They may look the same but the Victors are stronger and faster.

Walmart has them for $2 for a pack of 4. There is no reason to cheap out and get the knock-offs.
Buy extras and keep them in your bird food container so they are really saturated with oiled sunflower aroma.

Victor traps both baited and placed in their high traffic areas.

I will get the Victor traps, but I do not have a bird seed container of any kind.

Maybe get a bag of seed on your same trip to buy the traps?

This mouse is costing me money, and it’s a tiny little thing.

Better than a squirrel in your house! :-D

Put peanut butter on the trap with a couple of sunflower seeds in it. And yes, get the Victor traps.

It’s man against mouse.

I don’t like to gainsay @LuckyGuy, he being published on the subject and all, but I do not like the Victor traps. They’re messy, because they often cause a rupture of the mouse’s body, and that leads to blood on the floor (or other surface), and that also makes it highly unlikely that you’ll re-use the trap (not that you were planning to, I suppose, but it offends my Yankee frugality to use it once and throw it away).

But that’s not even my biggest objection. The primary problem that I have with the Victors’ traps is that they’re touchy and difficult to set. They often spring as I place the baited and set trap into position, meaning that I have to do it all over again. Etc.

For those reasons I like the Better Mousetrap, which kills by suffocation – so no mess – and is simple enough to bait and set one-handed. Best of all, even if it does spring in your hand – or on it – it’s a ‘soft’ spring that won’t hurt. I’ve used them with such great effect that I hardly have to use them at all any more.

I use bird seed as bait (not cheese) since it is clean, does not attract ants, is easy to insert and does not corrode the metal bait pedal. A $2 bag of oiled sunflower seeds will last forever.
Relevant video
The longer you wait the more there will be. They will not go away by themselves. They can reproduce in 6 weeks so the earlier you get them the fewer there will be.
Yes, the mouse is costing you money – increased A/C cost. It is also costing you peace of mind as well.

I hit them fast and hard when my house is invaded. I set out 16 traps or more. I use a thermal imager to search for warmth or cold air leakage where there shouldn’t be,
I use high energy UV to light up the mouse urine so i can follow trail. The little buggers dribble pee as they walk! Unacceptable! (Who do they think they are? College freshmen?) I also have an ultrasonic detectors that listens for mouse pup distress calls in the 30–40 kHz region and frequency shifts them down to the human audible range.

I take home invasion very seriously. ;-)

@CWOTUS does bring up a good point, Occasionally there is blood but that is rare. I am very careful about trap placement. That makes a difference. When my traps get them it’s over in an instant.

@Hawaii_Jake It may seem like “man against mouse” but get a few trap sand leave them in place for a while, because it may be man against mice.

Anybody remember Willard?

One more comment and then I’ll stop. I don’t want to further geek anyone else out.

I’m an engineer and can’t help it. If I own it, I have to modify it. It’s a rule.
So naturally I have modified my Victor Snap traps.
While Victors have the best spring and the fasted action, (measured with a high speed 2000 fps video camera) I noticed that the spring could be made even a little faster with slightly more torque. Using pliers grab the end of the spring on the right hand side of the trap and reposition the tail end of the spring inboard by about 10 mm. That reduces friction and directs the torque more perfectly perpendicular to the trap’s axis of symmetry.

OK I’d better stop now.

^rolls eyes

@Hawaii_Jake Wait ‘til I tell you about how I set them!
I also use statistical methods (reliability growth curves) to predict how many are in the area.
When the analysis indicates a 95% confidence limit that there is fewer than 1/10 of a mouse in the house, I can put the traps away.

@LuckyGuy I’m all ears.

no need to go crazy. If you have seen no other evidence of mice in your house before the guy in the closet, you’re lucky. His doom is more or less assured, and I’m firmly in the Victor camp. I would bait a single trap with peanut butter, place it against a wall in the closet, and your problem should be solved overnight. A single mouse is a damned busy animal and can defecate and chew things up to the point of convincing you an army of rodents is after you personally. The 2 questions remain. How did he get there, and where are his “friends”? I would distribute the remainder of the traps around the house as sentinels to determine whether you have an infestation or a single rude “guest”. Once the guy in the closet is dispatched, if the other traps aren’t tripped you should leave them in place as sentinels.

Sadly, I’m not kidding about the use of thermal imaging, ultrasonics, and optics. They make it easy to find points of entry and egress, and nesting sites. They don’t stand a chance.

One trap is baited and set.

I’ve decided on one for the moment. There’s no scat anywhere in the house. My intuition tells me he just got in. I’ve never seen a sign of mice before now.

One trap? That’s it?! What kind of Shock and Awe is that? ;-)
I make a map and set them out at various pinch points around the house. I also change the orientation of the traps. Some are facing the wall some are parallel and some are opposite. In my barn I even have some screwed vertically to the wall next to the floor.
I don’t want them to learn how to get by without tripping a trap somewhere.

In my barn I leave some unsprung but baited traps out all the time so they get used to them. I figure that gives the smart ones false confidence.

We have a recurring rat problem.

1)
For the most part, I use ye olde Victor traps. We also use them for a friends cabin in the woods, too, for the mouse problem. I put them outside in a wooden box (so nobody has to look at the dead rat) with pieces of hot dog as bait.

2)
Every couple of years, they get into the walls, and I escalate the fight. The most effective method is having the exterminator use professional poison bait. After a few weeks, the rats are all dead and I don’t notice any for six months or a year.

HOWEVER, a poisoned rat can crawl into your walls and rot. You might smell it for a couple of weeks.

3)
The poison from the big box hardware store does not work

@Call_Me_Jay Victor makes a scaled up version of the familiar mouse trap. They work on squirrels and will work on rats. Be careful setting those. They can break a finger.
They are scary but work well. Snap trap for rats

The fox in my backyard eats very well.

Yes, I know the rat trap very well, thank you.

Mouse traps would not stop the monsters in my neighborhood.

If we’re ever involved in an actual Mouse War, I want @LuckyGuy as the general on our side. Man, that strategy! Even leaving sprung baited traps around for the “winners” to get cocky and “overconfident” upon. I can’t wait to read the full training manual, the white paper on strategy and tactics, and to someday earn the security clearance to participate in the intelligence side of things. Not to mention the logistical tail, of course. An anti-mouse army might travel on its stomach less than Napoleon’s, but still … Boot camp must be awesome in Upstate NY.

I find the Victor snap traps easy to bait and set. You do have to be careful, because (obviously) they are designed to spring with subtle motion. But if you have a steady hand and set them where they are meant to lie (instead of moving them after setting) it’s not difficult.

I’ve never tried to scent them with birdseed or anything like that – just use a seed-based bait (because that’s what they eat, not cheese). They’ve always been effective for me.

^Hold the spring down with your hand. I clamp my thumb over the spring, and add bait without the possibility of it springing. Then set the holding mechanism….

An old style wooden mouse trap won’t hurt your hand. Maybe your fingertips but not your hand.

RAT TRAPS are different, but the little mouse traps are rather weak against a human-sized foe.

A snapping trap will get the job done. Or an electric trap if you’re willing to spend a little more money for something you can reuse.

But I would certainly advise against the use of glue traps. In my mind they should be outlawed as a form of animal torture. Basically the animal gets stuck, panics, and proceeds to rip itself to pieces – even doing so far as to chew their own limbs off to escape. And if you find it still alive, you have to deal with a terrified, suffering animal that’s most likely injured. I do not see the point of putting the animal through that much pain and misery when you can kill it quickly via other traps.

Even if you “don’t care” about the animal, you should at least understand that is unnecessary cruelty. Pest or not, it doesn’t deserve to be tortured like that. Though if you’re OK with torturing an animal to death, speaks volumes really.

Agreed @TheBarnyard If you are going to kill then do it quickly and as painlessly as possible. And have the disposal as easy as possible too.

My husband is very anti-mouse. If there is an infestation (we live in the countryside so it is likely) he fills all the holes he can find in the skirting boards, floorboards, walls, door jambs etc. Stopping them from entering is the best policy. So I’d recommend you get the plaster/sealant out and get filling.

He’s dead. Peanut butter on a Victor trap. Thanks, all.

Thanks for the update. Please reset the trap(s) and let it(them) sit out for a few more days. It is very possible Micky had siblings. Wait a week to be sure.
Good luck.

I’ve ordered an ultrasonic repellent device to try. I will also put out some traps to be sure. Thanks, all.

“You dirty rat.”........

Despite what the ads say, ultrasonic devices do not work. Sure the mice (and bats and mosquitoes) can hear it but they don’t fear it and quickly tune it out. The sound of your footsteps is much more frightening for a mouse.

I’ve tried confusing bats by sending high powered pulses of ultrasonic energy at them. Nothing! They are so sophisticated! Their chirp is comprised of 2 or 3 different ultrasonic frequencies and each bat has its own combination! That is how hundreds (thousands) of bats can fly out of a narrow opening in a cave without colliding into the walls or its neighbor. They know their own voice and can pick it out from dozens of others firing at the same time.
I am but a simpleton. I can copy one bat voice and play it back and maybe see one bat move unexpectedly. Maybe.

Female mice respond to the ultrasonic distress call of a pup. And while females can identify their own pups they will come to the aid of any pup that calls for help. A constant tone does not sound like a pup.

Mosquitoes just laugh. They are looking for the CO2 plume you leave behind when you exhale. They can smell you when they are downwind. But when they are upwind they can see the CO2 and water vapor you give off since it looks black under IR light.

Keep the traps out. Like chipmunks, mice, no matter how cute, are not your friends.

Thank you. I have cancelled the order for the repellent device.

Great!!! I accomplished something good today!

agreed.

I was recently in a hobby shop buying epoxy and saw this Mousetrap Racer kit car from Midwest Products. They are powered by a Victor mouse trap which is included in the kit. More proof that Victor traps are the best!
And everything is made in USA.

WOW. Now there’s a damned cool and innovative toy!