Of mice and flies ~ October 1, 1998

David Heiller

Warning: The following column contain graphic (but not salacious) material. And if that doesn’t get you reading it, nothing will!

Winter must be coming, because our house is filling up with mice and flies. It happens every year at this time.

I can understand the mice. They feel temperature changes, so they head for a warmer home, which happens to be my home.

But flies? Are flies that smart?

I don’t like living with either one. I love my wife and two kids and two dogs and one cat. But mice and flies are not welcome.

Cindy alerted me to this fall’s mouse invasion about a month ago, when she found shredded toilet paper in the bottom of the bathroom vanity, where she stores things like toilet paper.

She figured mice were using it for something other than its intended purpose. She figured they were using it to make a nest. You know what that means. More mice!

A battle plan was needed, so she called on me. I’m Chief Mouse Catcher in our house. I’ve been refining the job ever since we bought our house in 1981.

Last year the mice came in through a hole in the pantry floor. I plugged it with a cork, so they have found a new entrance into the vanity. It’s harder to stop this invasion, because it means pulling the vanity away from the wall and disconnecting the drain and two water lines. I’ll get around to it eventually.

Mouse noses are a small thing...
unless that is all you find. Eeks!

At about the same time that Cindy found evidence of mice bedding, we found a partially devoured mouse on the rug beneath the kitchen table. Cindy pointed it out to me discreetly, because it was lying at the feet of Cindy’s mother, Lorely, who was visiting.

Lorely was inches away from stepping on it. That would not have been pretty. You would have seen this headline:

Woman steps on mouse, kills 
son-in-law in fit of rage and terror

I picked up the mouse part—all that was left was the nose and whiskers—with a paper towel and threw it outside. Finding half a mouse on the floor is kind of like biting into an apple and finding half a worm. It’s not a very pleasant encounter.

Miss Emma, the mouser.

Our cat, Miss Emma, must have caught that mouse and eaten as much as she pleased. Emma used to be a good mouser, but she is 16 years old now, and has lost her appetite for catching mice.

I found an old mouse trap, baited it with peanut butter, and set it in the vanity. The bait disappeared, but the trap didn’t spring, and the toilet paper kept getting shredded. I checked the trap after a week and found that it wasn’t working. I could barely trip it myself.

This turned out to be a good trick on my part, because word spread far and wide about the free peanut butter in the Heiller vanity and I have been catching mice ever since in the new trap. I have to empty it almost daily.

Mice might be smart enough to find their way into a house, but they aren’t smart enough to figure out why all their friends and relatives never come out after they enter.

I was telling Red Hansen about our mouse invasion, and he reported a similar movement at his home. He baits his traps with flour. That made me wonder what other people use for mouse bait. If you would like to share that secret with Askov American readers, send it to me at P.O. Box 275, Askov, MN 55704. I’ll pass the information on to Tammy Olson. She might want to include it in her column, The Practical Pantry.

Flies are the other nuisance we have this time of year. I was working on the computer on Sunday in the office, and noticed  a lot of them on the floor. A lot-lot. There was a whole windrow of flies on the floor. I didn’t know whether to sweep them or bale them. I took the vacuum cleaner after them, and then the broom, and when I was done, there were already a few more on the floor. The air must be full of flies that are coasting to a dead stop.

So many flies, Asian lady beetles,
and throw in a few boxelder
bugs for good measure.

Flies flies flies! They walk groggily on the floor. They lie in the light fixtures. get ground into the bathroom rug. ARRGGHH!

I imagine there are some people reading this column who are repulsed by the thought of a mouse or even a fly in their house. But I bet there are a few readers who are saying, “I guess we aren’t the only ones with this problem.” That’s life in the country.