Mouse vs. Man

A few weeks ago Vero noticed something in the pantry that looked like black rice. I had never seen mouse poop before but after a quick search on this thing called the “Internet”, we realized that we did in fact have a mouse in the house. Plus we noticed it had nibbled on a few items.

We went and picked up four traps and loaded them with peanut butter. Those sneaky mice managed to take all the peanut butter without setting off the traps! What the heck? I imagined that there were at least three (blind) mice working in tandem to accomplish such a feat.

Over the next few weeks the same thing happened. Mental note: Mouse traps from Canadian Tire sucketh. Even Dad and Mom had a good laugh when they would wake in the morning and see no more peanut butter.

My friend Michael came to my aid and lent me a contraption called the Mouse Inn. The photo seen here is the hilarious photograph on the box. Yes, I’m expecting a mouse to live in the lap of luxury (hello Joe Schmo Show!) inside this trap! Essentially, it’s a cylinder where you put some food in one end and when the mouse enters to get the food, the cylinder tips on it’s pivot point and closes the door and traps them.

I set up one trap and lo and behold, the next morning the trap had been sprung! I picked it up and noted that I didn’t hear any squeaking or any movement so the poor guy must be pretty scared. I packed it into the car and drove 4 kilometers down the road (heard someone say that you have to get rid of the mouse outside a 2km radius or it can find its way back) and opened the trap and dumped the contents out into the snow.

Turns out the contents were a few peanuts I had put in there the night before! What the heck? Somehow the trap had sprung itself! Those crazy mice!

I was not too impressed and I set up two traps that night but nothing had happened in the subsequent nights and I wondered if they were scoffing at the measly peanuts I had placed inside when they were fattening up from some peanut butter.

This morning I checked the traps and one of them had sprung. Not expecting much I shook the trap a little and did not hear any food inside. I was really pissed off at this point…”How can they take the food and get out!?”. I popped the trap door open near my face and had quite the scare when I saw some beady eyes and some whiskers staring back at me! I’ll be honest…I have never seen a mouse before so it was quite the fright this early in the morning. I did feel bad that it was dead though and wondered if it suffocated.

I drove out to deposit the mouse remains and brought a little stick in case it wouldn’t fall out easily. Vero had mentioned before I left that I better watch out in case it’s just playing dead…sure enough she was right! Good thing I gave the trap a whack down into the snow. The mouse hit the snow and then bounded away from me! What a sight! Two frights in one day.

I feel a little victory over this little guy but not much as he got a lot of peanut butter. I am going to set up a few more traps for the next while to see if there is more than one to catch!

iplaying: Where the Hawkwind Kills – Daniel Lanois (Acadie)