So, in the spirit of cleanliness, and in an attempt to dispose of the strange sounds coming out of under the sink, we bought some traps.
Normally, I'm all for the "I don't have to see them" variety of spin traps. The premise is simple. Mouse smells something good, they go inside to investigate, the lever snaps closed, neck broken and mouse inside trap. The plus side to this is that you never actually have to touch said (dead and flopping) mousie... Its a big bonus.
Well, that didn't seem to work, unfortunately. After a full day and night of continued sounds and prestine traps, we decided to up the stakes. Full on snap traps. You know the ones. They're spring loaded metal attached to a piece of wood thats baited. If the mouse steps (or breathes too hard, Sean has a sore thumb from showing me how they work) on the baited part, the metal snaps over them and breaks their neck or seriously wounds them.
At least, thats what its supposed to do... helps if you're dealing with a mouse.
A mouse, even a big one, is typically 2-3inches long. This was not a mouse. Which is why, of course, the traps didn't work. It took two days to get this guy, and even then when Sean went to dispose of him, HE DIDN'T FIT IN THE TRAP!
The green is where the "mouse" was laying while Sean watched its death throws... When I got home, Sean described the "mouse" and explained how he used an old towel rack and a paint stirrer to chopstick it into the trash. He kept insisting it was a mouse because it was cute and gray and surprisingly clean looking. We think he might have been someones pet rat that got into the wall or something. (Because of that, I've been calling him Pickles. Its a good rat name, Pickles... right?)
The problem was that he didn't know if it was dead or not. It wasn't in the trap, and it looked dead, being that it was flopping around when poked and didn't appear to be breathing. But who wants to be holding a wild animal of any variety when it 'comes to' from being knocked out? Originally he was going to either hit it with a hammer or stab it with one of my steak knives, but (thank goodness) decided instead to Macguiver it into the trash and run it out to the dumpster.
After eating dinner, we came home and I cleaned under the sink with copious amounts of lysol and found how he had been coming into our humble abode.
I also found some very telling paw prints on the side of our trash can...
The good news is that we got him, and that I've plugged the hole by covering it with a metal scouring pad that I nailed to the wall. Under the sink is clean and the hole is plugged, but just in case our little buddy was a momma, we set some more traps up just in case.
Rest in Peace, Pickles... can't say I'll miss ya.
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