OF MICE AND THE MAN...

When we first got Roxy we put her dog food in a giant Tupperware container with a good sealing lid.
This was due to my association with a friend who worked for Terminex who,
once told me that critters go where ever they can find dog food...
and that dog food was an excellent bait for traps.

We have been fortunate not to have indoor critter problems...
so far...
with the exception of ants.
(Which are as inevitable as death and taxes.)

So... into the Tupperware with Roxy's food.
Then it was stashed under the kitchen bar counter,
next to her food and water dishes.
There it stayed until an ant attack forced us to move her dishesto the shop,
where ants did not bother to go.
I'm not sure why that is.
Yet, sure enough, the ants did not follow.

The first time I spied the shop mouse,
she was looking pretty fat.
Never a good sign with a mouse.
The next time she skittered by in the corner of my vision,
she was slimmer.

I like mice.
I used to have a large walk-in closet in the house where I grew up,
that my mother allowed me to use to raise mice to sell as a business.
I had at one time 28!
(All in cages of course.)

The man, however has no sympathy for mice.
I must agree that the wild variety are not good for human living spaces,
but I'm kind of funny about killing them.
I'd rather catch and release.
:-)

When the man spied the mama mouse, he set a trap.
Whap! Whap!
He quickly dispatched two mice bodies to the dumpster.
I admit to being a mite sad at this,
but they were mature mice who had lived full mousey lives.
Better a quick snap of the trap than slow death by playful kitties.

Not long after I spied a tiny puff of fur with a pink tail by Roxy's dish.
One of the food pellets must have been a feast to someone so tiny.

To tell or not to tell...was my question.
Yes it was a wild rodent full of nasty germs and disease.
But darn, it was cute!
I didn't say a word.
(Shame on me!)

Roxy ratted me out!
That pig bull nose of hers began to snuffle and search.
Who's been eating my porridge?
She spent hours at a time trying to track my fuzzy secret friend.
The man noticed and the trap came back out.
He uses peanut butter for bait... another tip from Terminex man.
The first night... nothing.
Yay!
the second night... nothing again.
Yay! Yay!
Unfortunately on the third try
the poor little fellow got the ax.

I wasn't at all surprised when I spied a flash of fur this morning...
close to Roxy's dish.
Where you see one mouse, there are at least six more.
She's out there snuffling again.
Sadly, we have plenty of peanut butter.
More dumpster funerals to follow.