Mice

I don't know what it is this year, but we are still getting an occasional mouse in the house.  Actually lately they appear to be shrews.  They are so small and cute but Tammy hates them anyway.  The other night she startled me with a shriek.  From under the couch she sat on a shrew ran over to the loveseat.

With my injury I couldn't lift the loveseat so instead I checked the mousetraps.  The cashew was gone from the trap by the refrigerator and the trap had not been triggered.  Another sign of a shrew: a very soft touch.  I reset the trap with another cashew (the only nuts I had available).  Tammy shrieked again when the shrew ran from the loveseat to under the TV.  Then again when it later ran from the TV to behind the radio.  I never saw the shrew.

The next morning after numerous failed attempts I finally caught the shrew.  I had to switch traps.  I used to have two mousetraps with a curl at the end of the lever.  When Tammy was at her Tastefully Simple conference a few weeks ago I had a shrew run around.  It ran into the bathroom and - aha! - I thought I had it trapped.  Then I found it slipped away under the wall behind the toilet.  The sheet rock there had been cut a little shorter and I forgot to get some trim and place along the floor.  I caught that shrew the next day.  In the meantime I discovered the mousetrap by the refrigerator was gone.  Tammy and I still haven't found the trap.  A major mystery as to where it disappeared to.   Anyway, I had replaced the missing trap with a newer trap.  This trap did not have a curl as the end and instead had a bit of metal in the middle of the lever under which I could place a nut.  However the shrew would always get the nut from the metal without triggering the trap.  Hence the trap switch.

Tammy really doesn't like mice.  A few months ago she saw a mouse after she turned the bedroom light on.  She shrieked and jumped on the bed.  I thought that only happened in cartoons or movies.


I also have seen lots of mice in the pasture as I spray the weeds.  They move once the spray gets near them.  Then I see them.  It is amazing how many mice are out there that we don't see.    I also have seen two garter snakes this year.  This is more than I have seen in the previous ten years combined.   Must be because of all the mice.