One Mouse, Two Mouse, Red Mouse, Dead Mouse

Last weekend, right after everyone left for the evening, Joy was doing a bit of laundry when she breathlessly came up the stairs proclaiming that she had seen a mouse. I dutifully went, looked, saw no mouse, but did see a half-eaten sweet potato. Like a good husband, I dedicated myself to getting it out of the basement.

The next night, I set our live trap with a bit of sweet potato, figuring the mouse already had a preference and knew where to find it. I was right. The next morning, the sweet potato was gone and the trap unsprung.

The next evening, I baited the trap with peanut butter on the trigger and sweet potato on the other side, figuring Mr. Mouse would need to climb over the trigger to get the potato and whamo, I'd have him.

The next morning, the potato was gone and the peanut butter undisturbed.

I figured I'd leave it set with the peanut butter one more evening and see if standing on the trigger to eat would catch our mouse.

It didn't. The next morning I found mouse droppings on the trigger, no peanut butter, and no mouse.

Figuring our Houdini rodent wasn't going to fall prey to live traps, I went and get a full-blown mouse trap and set it with peanut butter. That did the trick. Mr. Mouse was caught, our basement was safe, all was right with the world.

But just in case he had a partner, I set the trap again Friday night.

Saturday morning? Yep, another mouse. So, I once again set the trap yesterday afternoon, baited it with peanut butter, and put it down, thinking there was no way I'd find another mouse.

This morning? Yep, another mouse. Any guesses as to how long our basement can keep producing mice? If only it would produce golden eggs this regularly, we'd be sitting pretty.