zras01

I recently purchased a 2008 Coupe with 30000 that had been laid up for a couple of months and I found tell tale signs that mice are around. They had been working pretty good on the weather stripping around the the rear hatch lift and I found quite a few mouse dropping in the engine compartment.

I know that cars that are put up a while have a tendency to inherit these critters and they can be very damaging.

I am open to just about any suggestion from anyone who knows how to get rid of them. I have not seen any............but I have this night mare that are lurking around behind the dash and in the engine compartment..

I put some bounce dryer sheets about the vehicle because I read that the mice hate the smell.

Any suggestions on getting rid of them and then keeping them out would be appreciated.

1968swbbigblock

Get some mouse traps and lay them around the edges of the car. Peanut butter will attract them.

Bruze

MORE THAN YOU WANTED TO KNOW ABOUT MICE

Heh, mice -- my biggest fear. I live in the woods with tons of mice around, and tons of nut trees to feed them. I keep my car in the barn which the mice have free access to.

I do have two cats who keep the mouse population down to a dull roar, but it only takes a few to make a mess of your car, or start chewing the wiring harnesses, etc. Not something I like to think about -- especially in this age of finicky electronics.

I stored my Harley in the barn for over 25 years with no problem, and had a rat Vette for a few years, no mouse problems with that either. But I am paranoid about the C6 with all the electronics.

Downy sheets: From Googling I found that they MAY keep mice away, but tossing them in somewhere where mice are already established will NOT drive them away.

Moth *****: Same as above.

A year ago when I put my car up I used a bunch of Downy sheets, and took cheesecloth (available at any grocery store) to make little bags of mothballs, maybe a half-dozen ***** per bag. I put all that in the interior and under the hood.

After I found a hickory nut in the engine compartment early last winter I decided to leave the hood up for the winter. With the hood down the mice have a nice playground that protects them from my cats; with it open they are probably not going to do much there.

Traps: I've had 3 traps out for a month or so this fall, have been catching 1-2 per night. Nothing the last 2 nights, so I am thinning them out.

Repellent: I bought some at Lowe's, have not put it out yet. But from Googling I've found that there is no sure-fire repellent, including the ones that send out an ultra-sonic sound.

At any rate, this past spring I had NO evidence of mice anywhere in/on my car for the winter.

But this fall I had an interesting experience. It was probably mid-October, mice were starting to move inside but I was still driving the car pretty regularly so I didn't worry about it.

After being out a few times I could hear this faint rattling when I went around corners or accelerated. I assumed it was from nuts the mice had put somewhere but I couldn't find them. Then one day I opened the hatch and there were a few hickory nuts in the left groove that the hatch closes on.

I took them out, but I could still hear them rattling. Every time I checked (same day) there were more nuts. I finally did get them all out.

Here is what happened: That groove (outside of the rubber seal) that runs around both sides and back of the hatch opening is a rain groove. I kinda noticed this when I'd be washing it but I never connected the dots: There is no drain hole on the right side, but there is on the left side. I assume the groove runs slightly downhill from right to left so the water drains out.

The drain hole is WAY back in; you can see it with a flashlight, and that's how they were getting the nuts in the rain groove. And the area is big enough so that more nuts kept rolling back after I thought I had them all out.

So I made up a cheesecloth bag with a few mothballs, hooked a piece of iron wire around it and fed it back until it covered the drain hole. So far so good.

That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

I absolutely HATE taking dead mice out of a trap, so I've been pondering buying one of these: Dunk 'Em mousetrap.


But this IS the best mousetrap:

jacktucky

If you're not worried about other pets get a poison.

I bought something from Lowes that looks like a bar of clay. Whenever mice come in, they find it. Only worry is that they will die in your house. I've never had that happen.

I have the poison wedged behind a box where pets can't get to it.

Also cats.

thehaggis

IF you have access to an infra-red camera, put the car out in the cold, then use the camera to find the nest.

KABAL182

One the best traps Ive used for mice is a 5 gal bucket. Its a simple homemade trap that we used for a hunting cabin upstate. best part is it can catch multiple mice overnight. If you google it , there are a few videos that show how to make one. A 5gal bucket , piece of wire, and a can or plastic bottle. basically . bottle is positioned over the bucket with bait on it, wire is run through it and is positioned over the top of bucket.it will spin like a log on water when weight is on it. ( the mouse) and he will roll and fall in. If you put about a gallon of water in bottom they will drown. And this trap will continue to catch as many mice that around because it will always reset itself. Also no dead mice in the walls from poison. Just dump bucket to dispose of mice and its ready to go again. Use peanut butter as bait.

RicK T

I had my first rat problem in my life this year. My DD sits outside and something decided to set up housekeeping in the engine compartment. I got a video recording of it one night about 11:45 PM. Set out a trap and caught one but it didn't match the one on the video. My neighbor caught 3 in traps in his A/C units outside. Problem seemed to stop for awhile but then started up again and finally cost me a couple hundred dollars to get the wiring in the engine compartment fixed a couple months ago.

My wife got me this stuff from Amazon. No problems since but it's a different season now so we'll see how it goes next Spring.

Anyway, might want to look at it, it smells "woodsy".

Bruze

There's a zillion (unedited, poorly made) clips of them on YouTube. Because I have to make things for a living, it's not something I want to do in my spare time.

That's why I put this link in my first post, Dunk 'Em mousetrap. For $20 it's worth it to me, but I haven't bought one yet.

zras01

Thanks......Tractor Supply carries it for 14.95. I going first thing in the morning and pick up a box. I had read about that stuff some time ago and you jarred my memory as I had completely forgotten about it.

zras01

We live on a ranch and I have a lot of field mice eating into my feed in the barn. I am going to purchase a couple of these Dunk'EM mouse traps and try them out there. Maybe I can kill two birds(mice) with one stone. The cats can't keep up with them. They catch a few and then go to sleep. I can stand them chewing on the feed sack but not on my prized vehicle.

Gearhead Jim

We had chipmunks in our garage, similar problem to mice.

Our solution:

1. Have-A-Heart traps outside the house to catch them followed by "sleeps with the fishes".
Probably not effective for mice.

2. Lots of glue traps in corners and along walls of garage, replaced when they get too dirty or dusty or "occupied".

3. Poison bait traps in garage in containers that keep out pets or kids.

4. Two Tupperware dishes with vent holes punched in the lids, under each car. One under the engine and one under the rear axle. About 20 moth ***** in each container, replaced every 90 days.

Since we started doing that about 7 years ago, no more problems with mice or chipmunks.

Bruze

Random thoughts on rodents:

- Live traps: I had one once and although it worked good, it was a disgusting mess. I assume because they are small and have a high metabolism, they die quickly without water. So you have a trap with dead mice who've crapped all over, and maybe a live one or two. I would take the whole thing down to my creek and dump them out (they drown in about 5 seconds) but the whole affair was pretty gross.

- "No touch" mousetraps: Sounds good, but the Victor Quick Set does not work that well because the trigger isn't sensitive enough. You'll catch one now and then, but a lot of times the bait will be gone and no mouse.



- "Snap E" Mousetrap: I used these years ago and they worked fine -- a couple of times. The hook that holds the bar back is plastic and after a few snaps it wears and won't hold the bar back any more.



- Glue traps: No good if you have pets around unless they can't get near the trap. Glue traps can also be very gross. Years ago I was using them in my basement and sometimes the whole thing would be gone. Apparently the mouse was still free enough to drag it off somewhere. So I bought big glue traps for rats. Well the mice couldn't drag it off, but one time there were two dead mice in it, and the last one had started cannibalizing the first one. Pretty gross.

- Rats: Are a lot smarter than mice, and can sometimes be difficult to trap.

ProfessorDeath

Pro tip: mice love chocolate. Lay the chocolate in a corner and use a glue trap to block the chocolate so they have to walk across the glue.

abc8cub

We have a place in Colorado out in the boonies and the pack rats would literally fill the engine compartment with weeds and stuff over the winter while we were gone. I put socks with lots of moth ***** in the engine compartment and absolutely no sign of pack rats for the last two years. I use the same thing in Florida (after mice ate the wiring to a headlight in my old Miata) and so far no more acorns etc. under the hood. Works for me and it's cheap.

I Fly Low

Downy sheets: From Googling I found that they MAY keep mice away, but tossing them in somewhere where mice are already established will NOT drive them away.

I think you're right about this. My father in law had two Shelbys for 30 years, using nothing but dryer sheets. Never had an issue. I had a Porsche with mouse problems, parked in the same garage, and started using dryer sheets after the mice were already there. After a few days, I found that the mice had used the sheets for their nest!

Bruze

fevest

I have a cat, but she can't keep up with them. So I use mothballs and mouse poison, inside the garage. Cat isn't inside. I put peanut butter in the poison and mix it up with the poison real well.
Seems to work.

87SAM

Be careful with the mothballs. For a couple years I had to store one of the Vettes outside in one of those portable huts. The car was sitting on a plastic type of tarp and I scattered mothballs on the tarp and the ***** ate right through the tarp did not have any mice in the car though

1rusty1

I used some poison. One day I was taking some of the engine covers off and there I saw a stash of the poison in the bay. Never found the mouse but the poison did it's job.

K7MXE

I built a water trap. Its a five gallon bucket with 2 gal of water in it.
On top I have a pill bottle with a hole in each end and a piece of welding rod. I have the rod secured to the buckets handle. Put peanut butter on the pill bottle. Have a simple ramp with goodies on it. I used decon but recently tried peanut butter. They eat on the way up the ramp but not too much then get to the top and head for the pill bottle which spins and they now remember their mouse mother did not send them to swimming class. Lots of plans on the internet.