Of Mice and Men

Shawn and I have been fighting quite a battle with two little creatures we have lovingly named Mickey and Minnie. To our dismay, the couple had been taunting us every step of the way. That all changed last night...well, sort of...

It all started when I came down stairs one morning, and found little black pellets on my counter.
Mouse poop.
Disgusting.

Now, Shawn and I are clean people. We wash our dishes, we make sure there isn't any food left out. Mice, it seems, do not care how clean you are. They will continue visiting you in the hopes that they will happen upon a crumb that wasn't swept away by your sponges. Until that happens, they will make a point to poop on all of your counter surfaces, your stove, your ceramic spoon holder that your mother made for you, your dishes, your sponges, your silverwear, etc etc. Needless to say, they had to go.

Our landlord bought us the biggest mouse trap I have ever seen. This thing could take down a small child. We set it up on the counter, and every morning, I made Shawn go into the kitchen first. I'm an animal lover, and the thought of walking into the kitchen and finding a crushed little mouse makes me shiver. Every morning he would enter the kitchen alone. Every morning he would call me in to see that they had eaten the bait, but had not been caught. We discovered that the trap wasn't sensitive at all. The mice could have a party on the trigger, and nothing would happen. Per my fathers suggestion, we tied meat to the trigger, in the hopes that they would have to tug on the bait, thus setting off the trap. We woke up to the string still tied to the trigger.

We created our own trap. Shawn made a make-shift ramp out of a Ritz cracker box that lead up to the opening of a large protein container. We put dabs of peanut butter leading up to the opening of the container, and a large drop of it inside. Our thought was that they would go in for the peanut butter, and not be able to get out.

Did you know that mice can jump?
Did you know that mice can jump higher than a large protein container?
Well, we didn't.
We woke up to a trap with no mice and no peanut butter.

They were outsmarting us. We had to get new trap, this much was obvious. We went to The Home Depot, and came upon a large assortment of mouse traps. That's when I saw one that would catch our devious little roommates, without killing them. They would walk into a plastic box, and up a metal ramp. Once they were on the ramp, flattening it to the floor, it would push up a metal door trapping them inside. It took 2 days for them to figure out that they needed to go inside of the trap to get to the peanut butter waiting inside.

Somehow, they had both gone into the trap. Somehow, the trap door didn't shut. Somehow, Mickey had wedged himself under the ramp and was stuck, trapping Minnie in. 
We'd won!
Victory was ours!

Then we tried to transfer them..

Mistake number 1: We decided to put them into the same protein container they had escaped from previously.
Mistake number 2: We tried to transfer them while still in the kitchen.

Although I'm sure he will dispute this, Shawn stood in the dining room and watched me while I tried to transfer Mickey and Minnie by myself. Once I got the trap open, Minnie fell into the container, no problem. Mickey, however, was still stuck. I used the top of the trap to cover the part of the container opening that was not filled by the trap. I cooed at him, telling him that it would be OK, and we would get him free. Finally, Mickey began to drop. While Minnie sat content with the cookie we had placed into the container to feed them, Mickey decided to spring a jail break. Suddenly, between the lid of the trap, and the trap itself, Mickey's little head popped out.

"WHAT DO I DO?! HE'S ESCAPING!!" I yelled.
"STOP HIM!" Shawn yelled back.

Too late. Mickey's little hands were gripping the edge of the container lid, then POP. Out he flew onto the floor. I screamed and dropped both the trap and the lid onto the counter, and ran onto the stairs, a safe distance away I felt. Shawn remained in the dining room.

"Did the other one get out too?!" He asked.
"I don't know! Cap it!!" I squealed.
"You cap it!" He squealed back.
"Shawn! Do it!"

Apparently, Minnie really was too preoccupied with her cookie to try and escape. One down, one to go. We set the trap again.

This morning I woke up and realized Mickey was back in the trap. He was stuck again, trapped by his own girth, but under the door this time. I was not going to be the one who transported him, that was for sure. After putting on sweatpants, a sweatshirt, shoes and gloves, Shawn opened the trap into a garbage can, this time in the basement.

On Tuesday, we're planning on releasing them into the park. I wish it wasn't as cold as it is, but as least they have a chance of surviving this way. Until then, I will be carefully watching the basement door. Watching for Mickey's little head to pop out from under it, and dare me to try and catch him again...Let's just hope they don't have any children who decide to follow in their parents footsteps.