I just put my car away in the garage about two weeks ago. Unforunately due to the weather i was unable to to give it a good washing and waxing before i put it away. Well today it was pretty nice and sunny out so i decided to clean the car. I back out of the garage lift the hood and decide to back up a little more to get intot he sun. When i get out of my car i look and there are mice runnig across my driveway :mad . Sure enough i look a little closer under my hood and all i can see is acorn shells and leaves :mad . A little time with the shop vac and all was cleaned up. I got about 8 bars of irish spring soap in around the car now, (this is what someone told me to use, doesn't smell near as bad a moth *****) Does this work?

 

my mom swears by that stuff to keep the deer from eating her flowers so sure it might work :smash:

 

I've got that same problem down here. :yesnod: Gonna have to try the soap thing. :cheers:

 

I put a couple of mouse traps under the car with peanut butter as the bait. They can't resist the bait and never get the chance to climb up the car. :seeya

 

Try mothballs don't think they like them. I store mine in a carbag never had trouble. It cost a little for bag but worth it. If mice get into wires or seats big money. :(

 

Ut oh. I got no cats. I hope i get no mice. :rolleyes:

I would say just drive it and you wont get meese but that would make me a hippocrit. So try the soap.

 

Sounds like Stuart Little is working his way up in the auto chain. Can't really fault the mice for wanting to hang out in the vette can you?

 

Once it gets cold, those mice start hunting for winter "homes"... rip up anything they can to make a "nest" and stockpile munchies all over the place.
I just heard this week, on Discovery channel I think, what is suppose to be a fail-safe way of keeping mice away - Oil of Peppermint on cotton ***** - just toss the cotton ***** around wherever you DON'T want the mice. Apparently they can't stand the odor. Cheap to try... :crazy:

 

My vette sat in a barn for 5 yrs and had moth ***** inside it when I bought it. I had to replace some wiring due to mice. I don't know if the mice just didn't mind the moth ***** or the moth ***** were added after mice were noticed. It did take a good 3 months of constant driving with the windows down and cleaning to get rid of the moth ball smell.

 

Yeah i am pretty sure mothballs work but i thikn they work on people too :D i can't stand the smell of them, actually the irish spring soap can get to me after a while too.

 

I tried an array of things. Here was the most entertaining one:

http://www.ratzapper.com/

Damn thing worked, but only for a few mice each, then both units died.

Ultrasonic units - worthless. I even caught a mouse out in the open, and ran over and turned up the volume of the ultrasonic unit. Played with every settings. Mouse just kept looking at me like what's that moron doing? I finally threw something at him - that accomplished more.

Best thing was to buy those cheap mousetraps - 50 cents each. Then, take a Reese's Cup, cut into small pieces. Squeeze a small piece onto each trap. Put 6-10 around the car. Check every day or so, because you'll have plenty of customers. Don't bother emptying the traps - some mice could be carrying diseases. It's only 50 cents - throw it (and him) away. Within a few weeks, you'll have them all taken care of (it'll be many more than you thought you had). Next step, look for the opening that they got in, and fix it. But they will still find a way. Keep a few traps set - you'll catch one every now and then. But there will not be any more lint or bedding in your engine or interior. BTW, set a few in your basement. You'll be surprised how many you will catch when you didn't think you had any. Ah, the joy of living in the country (wife hasn't seen the 3' black snakes that live under the front steps yet:) )


[Modified by gh86E, 12:51 PM 11/21/2002]

 

Leave your Vette outside until the motor is completely cold, then put it away.
It's the warmth of the engine that's attracting them.

 

I've been trapping some this year. I've already vacuumed out two nests from under hood.

The other day I noticed one of my traps is GONE! !@#$ mouse must have crawled away with it. I've been looking all over for the darned thing...

 

Yeah, they're clever. That's why I find Reese's cup works well - you have to push it into the trip. They'll eat the bait off the trip if it's just sitting there, and you'll catch only a few (you'll see the bait missing from most traps). You really have to squeeze it in so they have to fight for it, and that's where Reese's works better than peanut butter. Besides, I nibble on Reese's pieces when I'm baiting a bunch of traps. But I haven't had them carry a trap off yet. I hope they don't read this forum.

 

Another trick is to place two traps together, business end to business end. When the mouse is eating the peanut butter off of one, he (or she) is likely to set the other trap off. I've watched them eat the peanut butter off of a single trap without setting it off.

 

And you know, wives wonder "How hard can it be to catch a mouse?" They just don't realize it's just not that simple.

 

I would keep looking for that trap! The same thing happened to me once in my basement. The mouse managed to slither under the water softener with the trap still snapped on him where he lived out his final days. Found it by smell not too much later! Yuck!

 

i just put mine away also and i used irish spring :eek:
downey drier sheets :eek:
moth ***** (around the outside) :rolleyes:
mouse and rat poision boxes :nopity
and mouse traps :smash:
i am jsut trying to determine what i forgot. :lurk:
i will als check every few weeks for critters :thumbs:
best of luck to all who store their pride and joy :seeya

 

Don't forget to stuff a wad of steel wool into those exhaust tips. Damned devil mice CAN and WILL crawl into your exhaust system, too. Mine's going into winter stasis soon as those lower control arms for my Bimmer come in off back order.

Till then I'm enjoying the ride. Winter be damned! :seeya

 

Last year my car had been put away for about 1 week. Washed and waxed with the cover on. I hadn't even thought about mice. This is the funny part. I keep a bowl of dog bisquits in the garage to coax my basset hound back into the house. I went to reach for some treats in order to bribe my dog back in and the bowl was empty. The funny thing was I had just refilled the bowl the day before. I asked my wife if she had taken them for the stash inside the house. She tells me no. Now i'm loosing my mind thinking where the hell did all of them go? Maybe the dog ate them? So I refilled and sure enough the next day the bowl is empty. Now I think my wife is just messing with my head. So I refill. The next morning on my way out of the house to go to work I see that it's empty again. I pulled the cover of the car and popped the hood. Ahah!!! All of my dogs treats where lined up at the lower edge of the windshield on the cowl intake filter. No rodents in site though. So I called my boss and told him I'd be late. I fired it up thinking I'd fry him (dumb idea but I was pissed). Set a couple traps and he was dead by the time I got home. This one little tiny mouse did all that work. Unbelievable! Dryer sheets throughout the engine compartment, a couple traps and irish spring in the interior. No problems since.