What to do about mice in the home

We have had mice for 3 months. We have killed 9. I just opened up the kitchen door and one ran across our counter. I HAVE HAD IT! My landlady doesn't care. In fact she is such a hag, she hates us and it's easier for us not to even talk to her since she is very abusive to us.

I will go to our US housing tomorrow and report this. In the meantime I have mice ruining my peace of mind. We have traps all over the house and I am sick of looking at them. I am ready to move into a hotel.

I woke up my husband and he moved a mouse trap right in front of where I saw the mouse hide. Now I have a mousetrap on my kitchen counter. We scrubbed the crap out of that kitchen today and the other day.

I just want to smash it with a big freaking rock. That's gross but...I've HAD it.

If your landlady is being so difficult, it might be best to try and find somewhere else to live anyway.

As for the mice ... either they are all living and breeding in your apartment or, more likely, have a nice secret entrance somewhere. Try to follow one the next time you see one, and work out where it runs to. Then block it all up. Or borrow a cat.

Hi Adrian. Thanks for the comment about the Ducky race, much appreciated, you are a sweetie.

They are living in the walls, mostly the above apartment via the ceiling. Jeff doesn't think there is a way to block the entrance, it's very hard to tell where that lead also. They are rennovating above us. And they hammered and sawed for weeks (starting on my birthday at 7 a.m.) We think it knocked the nest about. Who knows. If what it's worth, they were on our deck and now they are inside which is 2,000 times worse then on the deck.

We are leaving in the spring but we'll see...after tomorrow.

I just thought there was a way I could kill that f&*&** tonight. I have some poison sprays. I'm ready to get up close and personnel. I'm fed up.

There's a nice lady trying to find someone to adopt her cat. That would work.

They're quite difficult to catch, but they are also not so smart. They run away by following edges (usually running along the bottom of walls). So if you team up with your husband you may be able to scare it to run towards the other of you who then stomps on it.

However, that'll leave a mess. They're not rats, and can actually be kind of cute (people keep them as pets) and as long as they have nothing at all to eat in your apartment (this means putting virtually everything in plastic containers or in cupboards with tight fitting heavy doors and no loose back panels) then they won't hang around for long.

It's odd that in a land full of rules people can make so much noise so early in the morning. Not just individuals but government contractors (eg roadworks) too. In the UK you're not allowed to start work (construction, digging, renovation etc - whatever) until 8am unless it's an emergency.

I've no idea what the rules are for quitting a lease early due to vermin infestation, but I'm sure you could get away with it if you can say your landlady knew about it and refused to help.

Or just cook them.

http://www.bertc.com/cooking_rats.htm
http://www.bridgewater.edu/~mtembo/mbeba.html

According to Deutsche Perfekt (March 2008) a judge will say you can withhold 100% of your rent if you have mice in a city dwelling.

Otherwise - having been there and done it with squirrels as well as mice - I'd advise zero tolerance. It's either a cat or pest control.

It is almost comical when you aren't in the actual situation. Stomping on it. that's like a skit really. Reminds me of the time we lived in Spain and my husband stomped on one of those water roaches (they are huge), it squished all over my leg and I was in shorts. That's gross.

Yeah, he keeps saying they are cute too. I just clean ed up loads of turds in our food bin with all cans and one thing of cookies they liked. I soaked everything in bleach water and the first can I picked up to put away had a turd on it. I lost it! I am so sick of looking around every corner, turning on the light and then opening my eyes in the middle of the night.

We accidentally caught one of the cute little shits in a green watering can. He was as big as a shot glass with his little pointy nose looking up at the edge of the green edge of hell he was in. He didn't want to do die in that green hell. We let him out and caught him later in out trap. Cruel cruel world huh.

What if you aren't in the city but in a small farming town, Mittelstadt, 72766?

According to swimmer's post above, like the mice themselves you're now living rent free. Cool. So spend your rent money on fine food and wine. Forget about the mice. Drink your troubles away.

Cannstatter Volksfest for you!

Oh boy, rent free, that will put the hag landlady in a spin but what doesn't. I just had some whiskey with my glass of red. We shall see tomorrow my friends. Thanks for replying.

Dude, there are no easy solutions out of this. Our cat has brought us three dead mice and one that was totally mauled, but still technically alive, in the last week. You're welcome to borrow him.

But really he's a crotchety cat. In the US, I'd say your best route is hiring someone for total tent the house pest control. But I don't know how that works in Deutschland.

And you'd have to do the whole apartment. Expensive.

"What to do about mice? ,
grill them

Why not offer to look after a cat for a week or two or failing that just invite one for the day, open all cupboard doors and wait for the action. Sometimes just the smell of a cat will send the mice away. The only other effective solution I can think of is poison.

Keep all food sealed, clean crumbs away from surfaces, empty bins every evening, if you really want to try a humane trap then put a little chocolate into the watering can (without water) or something else they can't get out of. Don't release them in your own backyard, they will come straight back.

Yeah, it's a big nasty dead end isn't it. I don't want to involve the abusive horrible witch landlady (AHWL) but she's liable, she lives downstairs too!!! Plus, if I go to US housing like I am going to (which I have never done in 2 years) ...wrath of AHWL. Oh, god. I'm just going to move into this guesthouse over this pub that we stayed at prior to moving here. See, it's not just the mice but the prison I live in, no help, no communication, no nothing, just blame blame blame before the issue is even on the table.

Yeah the mice...like I said...a nasty dead end isn't it. I wonder if he's still behind the toaster?

if you really want to try a humane trap then put a little chocolate into the watering can (without water) or something else they can't get out of. Don't release them in your own backyard, they will come straight back.
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I like that idea. The cheese isn't really getting them but they have ate chocolate, cookies, and taco shells.

They go mad for peanuts - try it.
And careful if you use poison... they crawl somewhere you can't get at them to die, and stink the place out for ages while they rot. Luverly.

i had the same problem back in the UK. Cheese rarely works, but anything sweet will lure them out, chocolate, preserves, stuff like that.
Hopefully you'll be rid of them soon

Thanks. Wow! I wonder why European mice like sweets? Kind of funny eh? Since I am a chef I need to figure that one out, very interesting. Haha, not like i'll be cooking for them anytime soon...but interesting.

This thread needs more pussy.

Good one! Cat's are so very strange.

Dr. Alban loves cats.

Not all cats mouse. They have to have learned it as a kitten.

These babies love mice. They can be tricky to catch however. Ours is called "Gracie".

We have caught 5 mice over a period of 8 or 9 days in the loft of our house. We live a bit out in the countryside & I suppose the bussards that frequently fly overhead eat their share.

Just keep setting the traps.

Mice can be a real pest at this time of the year coming in from the fieds looking for a warm winter home. When we lived in the Penines in Yorkshire we had them every year, it was a stone house built in 1779 and I never did find out how the got in.
But I got rid of them every year in about a week or so. I used both traps and bait.
My first option would always be traps. I used plastic mouse traps that were easy to set. I would put a tiny scrape of cheese (not a piece as they can lift it off the trap without setting it off) You can leaves the scrape of cheese on for years.

Put the traps at the edges of the areas of where you want them ie at the skirting board with the open trap facing into the room not along the skriting board. I used 3 traps and would catch the lot in about 3 days.
If you have them in difficult access areas us the bait that looks like a brillo pad. The first year we had them in the loft we could hear them all night .
I put my head in the loft trap door and chucked them to the areas we had heard them. After 3 days we heard no more.

We lived there for about 5 years and I did it every year, but each year there was less of them.

If you cannot bring yourself to do this there are pest control firms that will do it for you, at a cost of course. Maybe your local council will do it for free or very low cost.

Rember they are vermin and you need to act.

Somebody must have a nice pie recipe?

Don't go down the poison road - it can be very nasty. We had a rat fall down in between the two layers of wall once - the smell was disgusting. Our daughter in London recently put down poison, and had exactly the same problem. Rodent died where no one can get it out, and you have to live with the smell. Best would be the proper pest control people. I had always had the idea that you could get somebody from the local authorities, if not free then fairly inexpensively. Worth calling them up first I would think. Then if you do have to pay, what about your landlady. I think an infested apartment is something that she should be sorting out, particularly if it wasn't due to you leaving food around in the open. I only say that because we were once over run by mice when my husband was away for 3 months. I had been making pictures (on the dining table) with the children using dried pulses and rice. Like leaving an open buffet for the mice who came in through the heating vents in the floor.

peanut butter (or nutella) works nicely too since it doesn't come of the trap and has an appealing aroma. But borrowing a cat for a while just to get the scent is also a good prevention, they'll just choose your cat free neighbor's warm house instead. (But when the scent wears off the mice return, better just kill them.)

Never had any luck with Nutella - but if cheese fails try raisens.

I agree with seth17, peanut butter works well and lasts a long time. We used to have huge mice problems at my parent's house when I was growing up (they live in the woods). Peanut butter, in both live and snap traps, was the only way we were able to keep their population in check. If you find where they're getting in you can plug the hole with steel wool. That usually puts them off. If all else fails, borrow a kitty or move. Good luck! Mice infestations are really nasty and frustrating.

You can get poisons now which dry out the mouse so it leaves no rotting smell, my mum used this recently when she had a little mice problem. The bloody things were stealing the rabbit's food from under his nose and he was terrified of them (even though he's bigger than any cat/small dog)

Putting everything edible in plastic containers is something you MUST do. But if I were you I'd get the landlady to sort it immediately, if she doesn't - go and see a lawyer or the Mieterverein thingy. It's in her interest to sort the problem asap. On a positive note: at least you don't have rats.

Not true. As long as they have at some point enjoying chasing things, they will probably also chase mice, even if they were taken from their mother before they could have possibly learned anything. But some cats just aren't into the whole chasing scene.

Also, the scent of a cat alone won't do much against mice, unless the scent is accompanied by sharp nails, quick reflexes and a thirst for blood.

Ask dreamer if you can borrow Emily, she'd have a field day.

Hahahaha, the mighty three legged hunter on an adventure weekend.

and then you expect said blood-thirsty monster to sit on you lap in the evening?

That's what mine do! One said monster is exhausted from the evening's hunt and snoring to my left as we speak. Type.

I think most cats enjoy chasing mice, they may just not kill them, just mangle them a little and then leave the broken toy. It is probably not the cleanest method of getting rid of mice.

Emily is a very neat hunter who kills with one bite to the spinal cord; no blood to speak of and a very bemused expression on her victims' faces. I only saw her eat a mouse once, possibly she ate her fill before contributing her spares to the family pantry.

And as for lap occupany and purring - she can't be beat.

Two things to do:

1. contact the Deutsche Mieterbund, Sonnenstr. 10, 80331 München, 089 552143-0, www.mieterverein-muenchen.de and report the landlady

2. I googled the situ and found several judge decisions. You can definitely deduct about 30% of the rent (without giving the landlady any reason to kick you out) depending on how severe the problem is

DEFINITELY talk to Mieterbund, they may get in touch with the landlady for you and they know the whole law situation.

Good luck. I can imagine how it must feel. I never got used to "sharing space" with roaches when I lived in NYC, yuck!!!

sorry, just saw you are located in Stuttgart but Mieterbund has offices everywhere in Germany, see their website

yes, but here, your landlord/landlady has to pay for that - unless he/she can prove you caused the mice coming in...
talk to Mieterbund and they will give you proper advice

Looks like you don't as need much help with the mice as you need with growing a backbone. You seem to be much more afraid of the landlady than you are of the mice. You're the tenants, she's the landlady, her responsibility so stick it up to her and stand up for your rights. If you can't get the landlady to help you with the situation, I think you should get the Mietverein on her ass and order vermin S.W.A.T. at her expense.

Good luck anyways.

I think Genie is right: you do need to build up a backbone as well... the Mieterverein may be able to sort out general problems as well to make your life there easier but the backbone issue is something you need to do by yourself. A skill that's helpfull for almost everything in life it'll be alright in the end I am sure.

Ha ha. You sound like a proud mama! One of my cats is so cat-perfect, she should be cloned. She hunts everything from lizards to birds (which, while great cat behavior, I am very sorry about) and then begs to come for a cuddle. You can place her on her back and rock her like a newborn baby, or do any sort of thing holding her without complaint, but with a purr. Plus, she sleeps in the funniest positions! And sleeps hard, too. She can totally conk out, which I've never seen in a cat before.

My kitty sleeping:

I just read the threads about the backbone. And I agree. I know where you are going with that and it's a long long story. Our lanldady is pretty crazy and everyone around town knows it, the postal guy, the electrician, etc... she's known as the witch (the postal guy said). Her husband has a brain tumor and is still very active (she drives him like a horse) and it's so very sad, it's been 4 yrs now since the diagnosis, he's nice. We moved in without knowing that the previous tenants were being sued by her. We found out on a German holiday and the day before we moved in. We filmed the whole place and took pics to protect ourselves. We moved in with all of that over our heads. We are American and we have Governments situations. We have communication problems with her too. I can't write this stuff anymore.

Reading the posts justs reminds me how auful it is to rent. I used to rent a house in BK and all though my German landlords were perfect I just hated not sorting things out for myself. Freedom and Independence the best things in the world. ( and health).

It sounds very frustrating. Depending on how much longer you may be here in Germany, perhaps it might be worth moving. Tell them anything, the space is not enough, you are pregnant, mother in law coming to live with you, whatever. If you give the notice and leave, not much she can do about it. A batty landlady sounds more aggro than you need. Don't stay just because you feel sorry for the husband.

@ spatown - Why even give a reason? Just move. And reduce the rent payments due to the rodent plague (sound so much more drastic than mouse problem).