Saturday, April 18, 2009

nuni and nooni schoener


Mice sometimes seek refuge in our home. Allie and I have named every mouse we've ever seen in our house Nuni Schoener or Nooni Schoener, after one of our favorite couples from Saturday Night Live.

Usually, the Schoeners are not a big deal. They show up a few times during winter months and then the disappear. But this year there seems to be a lot of Nunis so we had to take action.

We don't want to kill them, because they're so cute. And our cats don't seem to want to either. So we took a cue from Allie's sister and rigged a humane trap.

We put some peanut butter and ketchup in the end of a carboard tube from a paper towel roll. Then we balance it on the edge of a shelf, above a tall garbage can. When the mice get to the end of the tube where the food is, they tip it over and into the can, where they're trapped.

It works!





We've caught four today and we've driven each to a wooded spot about two miles from our house.

I would like to know if mice can find one another and rebuild their communities in new locations. I hope so.

2 comments:

Applecart T. said...

I've heard that relocated squirrels end up being in trouble for being in other squirrels' territory … I have no idea the migration-ness of mice. Your cats are interesting. And dogs. No hunting! From my blog, you know I have few qualms (I repress them with thoughts of disease and the other mice I have saved, as well as the ones our family used to buy to feed a snake …) about murdering rodents.

Chuck said...

Dude, you seriously need to either get new cats or retrain the ones you have. The law of the wild is sometimes kill or be killed. That's how it is if you want to live in tandem with nature instead of at cross purposes with it.