"MY" Mice

Last night, I nearly dropped a tray of unfrozen ice cubes as I jumped back startled. There was a mouse butt sticking out from under the fridge. Said butt was, as it turned out, attached to a newly dead mouse, who I scooped up and deposited in the trash. It skeezed me out for a few minutes, which is unusual. You see, mice are a fact of life. I live in the woods adjacent to a farm. My 250 year old house has so many inroads for rodents, I could never get rid of them all.  D Con is my friend.

 For the 9 years my dog lived, they were much less daring about asserting themselves, as she was a good mouser, but that doesn't mean I didn't occasionally find one who'd made his way into the dog food bin and died there, or have to prompt the sleeping dog to give chase.  Two days after I put her down, they were running across the living room floor while I sat watching TV. Somehow, I don't think they'd come to pay their respects.  Yet, just last week, I was marvelling at the lack of scratching in the walls, droppings under the kitchen sink, and sticks of butter with pretty gnaw marks all over them. It's been a very snowy winter here, so it seemed they should be overrunning the place by now. Of course, spring is right around the corner, and perhaps the ones who survived the winter by hibernating underground, as opposed to trying to tough it out in my frozen basement or walls,  are on their way, led by the cute pioneer under the fridge.
As I said, they are a fact of life for me. And I am usually unfazed by them. However, there have been a few memorable moments,  and persistent rodent related sources of ire, which I'll share below.

Because I mow nearly an acre- and let's pretend that I do this at least once a week consistently-  I have a nice little garden tractor. I keep it in the shed we moved up here from my parents' house  (great story for another time). Before I had the shed, I parked the then mower beside the house, and covered it- again let's pretend I did that consistently- between mowings. If you know anything about rural life or wildlife, you know that a warm engine seems a palace to a cold animal. Farm friends always check the fan for feral cats in winter (or they do after the first mess is cleaned up), and I have a friend and neighbor with a horse farm  who has pulled into Rockingham Park or Suffolk Downs innumerable times with a flaming nest of mice somewhere in the engine block. Normally, this is a spring and fall problem- spring for nesting, fall for hibernation. But,  MY mice can- and do- move in overnight, even in August. Why they feel the need to live in such a strangely configured environment mid-summer is beyond me. People think I'm exaggerating, until they witness it.
Not only do they keep it up all summer, but normal deterrants don't seem to affect them. MY mice will not only circumvent a strategically placed box of mothballs, they have more than once shred pieces of the box for bedding. Of course, that rendered those ones dead before I had to remove them. Which I prefer. My mowing day starts when I open the hood, pull the air filter, and peer inside (hoping not) to find that week's nest. Then, it goes well or poorly. I really don't like it when the occupants are home, and start scampering around the engine block before I can get the cover off , nor when a newly born litter has to be disposed of. Empty nests are best. I've had mice run up my arms and down my legs. I've had to extract them with pliers(really sucks if they aren't-or weren't- dead).  After I reassemble the mower, I can mow. Most  people add fuel and check the oil and tires, I evict the mice, too.

The shed is such a haven for the mice, sitting as it does right next to the woods, that I can store nothing that could forseeably be chewed up for a nest. Even if I hang  things from the ceiling, they are at least a mess come spring, at worse shredded. And, as I said, moth balls aren't as effective as they should be. So I'm forced to store many  items that should be in the shed in the house, where the mice have all that nice new insulation for bedding material. Which brings me to my next problem.

The house is in a perpetual state of rehab. Since moving in -17 years ago this month- I have remodelled most of the downstairs (not to completion), as well as my bedroom and walk-in closet . MY mice seem to really appreciate all the effort, as evidenced by their tendency to frequent- and alter to their own specifications- my newly renovated spaces, in stead of remaining relatively undisturbed in the unused and untouched parts of the house. I moved into my  bedroom just shy of a year after buying the house. Within a week, while ironing at 5AM, I watched as  a mouse poked a hole in the new sheet rock and ran across the beam to the other side of the room, where he descended the dresser and disappeared into another fresh hole behind a second dresser. Really?? It was the only room in the house with new walls. This pattern continues, unabated.

Over the years, even my more squeamish friends have grown accustomed to seeing the mice, and the evidence of their status as co inhabitants here. I do have good friends, as evidenced by the following story. One subzero night, early on in my tenancy, I had scheduled a Tupperware party, both to help a friend get more free stuff, and to get some for myself (so I could stop feeding the mice so well). Since I had no heat, we all huddled close to the wood stove, while the poor demonstrator tried with freezing hands to steady the samples, which kept blowing over, owing to the wind barrelling through the living room.  After she and the 3 or 4 mere acquaintances in attendance had left, my other friends informed me that several mice had  run across the dark floor, toward the warmer wall behind the wood stove, throughout the party. These friends  had simply pulled their frozen feet up into their laps and endured what- for at least 2 of them- was the longest Tupperware sales spiel  ever.

I've tried reasoning with the mice. I've tried yelling at them. I put the DCon out when they seem to be taking over. But mostly, I've resigned myself to life with them. I dislike finding them dead in corners and under cabinets (on average once a month), but I prefer it to them running across my feet (yup, more than a few times).  I plan to get a new dog this year, so that should help- although  mice LOVE dog food. Better the dog's food than mine. Spring is coming, so the battle front should shift back to the shed and the mower, soon. Wish me luck!