Eek, a mouse! Or, how to get rid of one?

My own experience – I bought a humane mousetrap, which worked very well, then I took the little guy to a wooded area and released him.

How you catch one with a humane trap, @Love_my_doggie.
And what did you use for bait?

The whole cheese thing is folklore and popular mythology. Mice eat carbohydrates.

I went to my local animal supply store and bought some mice food – really just grains, dried fruit, and seeds. I loaded the trap with some food and left it where I’d seen a trail of mouse droppings.

Thank you, @Love_my_doggie.
I checked the humane mouse traps, going to get one tomorrow.
Was yours like a small, round cage, with an top entrance?

It was made from clear plastic, shaped like an elongated shoebox and with plenty of air holes. The lil’ critter entered through one end of the box, and a door dropped to shut behind him. He looked rather content inside there, and not at all frightened; I think he might have been enjoying a safe, if temporary, home plus all that yummy food.

Gotcha!

I had a bunch of mice two years ago. Put out traps with peanut butter in them. Caught some but couldn’t take it any more when I saw one mouse in its death throes in the basement. Called an exterminator who put down poison and blocked the holes. No more mousies.

The poison is not a discriminant killer. It will attract moat animals, and kills all that ingest it. If there are any pets around, I would recommend an alternative. Often times, the mouse will die, and be consumed by a dog, or cat. The poison still works, even in the dead mouse’s stomach, so it will kill the pet. It is lethal to very large animals in extremely small doses.
Most of the poisons are anticoagulants. It’s a pretty terrible way to die. If that matters to you.(I won’t judge you. )

They make plug in devices, that emit a sound that only mice hear. It’s supposed to keep them out of areas where they are positioned. I’ve heard they are effective. I personally would prefer that. Better than smelling a dead mouse in the walls.

Yep, peanut butter is the bomb for mice. Yes, rethink the poison, bad news for risk of secondary poisoning of other animals like cats and birds of prey. Since you are the 8th floor probably small risk of a hawk swooping by but still poison is bad, bad, bad. Last resort if trapping doesn’t work. get a cat. hahai

I used peanut butter.

Peanut butter, also place traps in mouse traffic areas. Sometimes they simply run over them.

DO NOT try to befriend it and feed it!!! They reproduce by meiosis, I swear!

I will refer you to this link. What is the best mouse trap?

And the procedure I use, shock and awe

I never use live traps. That moves the problem to someone else.

I once found a nest of little baby mice after my friend trapped and killed the mom. I didn’t have the heart to do them in so I bought kitten milk replacement formula and soaked bits of bread in it as they were almost of weaning age. They all lived in a little plexiglass aquarium on top of my fridge. They all survived and I released them out in a big field.

I also had a Deer mouse named ” one eyed Jack” that my cat caught and I rescued. He lost one eye and half his tail but lived another year or so in an aquarium, fat and happy. I have also rescued and saved numerous baby Gophers and Voles. For years I joked abut the “RTU”. The rodent trauma unit. LOL

Put bacon instead if chesse. It smells stronger so it’ll attract it sooner.
I wouldn’t recommend poison. It’ll die hidden somewhere in the house and then it’ll rot and stink until you find it.

Better to catch it alive and just dump it in the container.
Or borrow a farm cat for a few days. But only from the farm, them city cats aren’t real hunters.

If there is one, there are two. Get a pair of mouse traps, set them behind stuff where you’ve seen the mice and wait for the traps to snap shut. Peanut butter works real well and is easy to apply for bait.

I have cats so I have no idea. They kill anything that gets in here that is not a human.

If you read the links above you know I put out a minimum or 8 traps. I place them in different locations and orientations. I also leave one unsprung.
Before putting the traps out, I open the packages and store them in a bag of bird food for a day or so to let them absorb the aroma of bird seed. Then I bait them with a couple of sunflower seeds and rub the wood with a bird seed peanut. Irresistible!
I’ve found that peanut butter corrodes the bait pedal if it is on lor a long time. Sunflower seeds do not.

Re humane/live trapping. My neighbor found a mouse on the third floor of his 1900 era home. He released in the park about 500 yards away and had to shake the trap to get the mouse out.
The next day he caught a second mouse and released it in the same place but this time the mouse quickly left the trap. Was it the same mouse? That’s when he decided to mark them with nail polish.
It turns out the mouse came back 5 times! He named it “Boomer” for boomerang.
My neighbor finally relocated Boomer about a mile away on the other side of a creek. He didn’t come back. Now Boomer is someone else’s problem.
I relocate them to a “higher plane”. They end up as food for the fox.

I use unscented Victor snap traps when the odd mouse strays as far up as my apartment. Supposedly, they favour seed-based foods (because they eat seeds in the wild), but ironically, my last mouse was caught with a bit of cheese.

I agree with @LuckyGuy‘s assessment: “I never use live traps. That moves the problem to someone else.” These are urban creatures, not “wild”. They will move into someone else’s house if you evict them from your own.

Well, find someone you hate and release them at their house!

@All, thanks for your input, it is very much appreciated!
The mouse has eaten some peanut butter, but dodged the snapping jack shut…
A smart mouse, I have.
Today I loaded two more traps, with bread with peanut butter.
Going to also add an empty, unloaded one, as @LuckyGuy suggested.
I ditched the poison trap (will dispose of it safely).

@rebbel I might have to come and nibble at the bread and peanut butter one. Catch a penguin?

Thinking…put the bread with only a tiny bit at the one end, under the snap bar to hold it, and most of it along the trap? (Honestly, this is really sad for me, but damn it. Sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do.)

It’s sadder for Jerry, @Dutchess_III…...
Thanks for your advice!

@janbb You could seriously hurt your beak, I wouldn’t want that to happen

YOU NAMED YOUR MOUSE??? Oh, now you really fucked up!

Yepper, you’re screwed now!

Also be sure to vary placement. Some should face the wall, some parallel, some opposite.
And leave a couple of sunflower seeds on the floor next to a trap or two. That way you will know whether the mouse is still around and is merely avoiding traps.