Built a new house.... and there are mice in the ceiling!!!!!!!!?

Question

Every night I hear them gnawing on something and it's annoying as hell. How can I get rid of them?????

I have kittens but no way they can get up there since there's no attic, just a heat/ac vent.... have no idea how the mice got up there!

Can I use those Pet Trainer that emits noise to chase them away?????????

Answer 1

Best recommendation is to call a pest management company to look your house over and figure out what is really happening. There are a couple of things that it could be. Because you stated you have no attic, it is possible that bats are in the ceiling, but doubt that, as you stated you hear gnawing and bats do not have large enough teeth for gnawing.

Most likely it is rodents, could be mice or rats. Mice need only a 1/4 inch opening to get in and rats only need a 1/2 inch opening to get in. A pest management company would look for these openings and recommend methods for sealing them up so that rodents cannot re-open them.

Be very careful if you decide to use bait. Grain type baits like d-Con can easily be translocated to another area that might allow the kittens to be poisoned. Block type baits are not as easily moved about, but a rat could carry it off, again putting the kittens at risk. If you are going to use bait, buy tamper and pet resistant bait stations to put the bait in. And contrary to all the wives tales, the rodents do not go outside or looking for water when they eat the bait. They go back to their nest where ever that is, and die. If that nest is inside a wall or ceiling, you will get an odor that can take months to go away.

Any of the ultrasonic units that you see for sale are total fraud. The rodents may react for the first hour, but they will quickly adapt to the new sounds and continue with their program, eat and reproduce.

Answer 2

Hey Vroom... congratulations on the new house!

I JUST got done eliminating the mice in my house. They weren't in the ceiling but rather in the walls between my unit and my neighbors (I live in a condo).

I also purchased a sonic pest chaser but the instructions warn you to place it in a way that they can escape. Remember that this won't kill them, it just encourages them to relocate and you want them to relocate OUTSIDE your house. I ended up not using mine.

Instead, I used the d-Con mouse bait that comes in cubes. There are perhaps 8 in a package, and I ended up buying two packages. I kind of tossed them into the area but someone told me that because mice have such bad vision, it's best to put the bait along a wall. This is how mice navigate. So if you can get near the point where the floor and wall meet, that's the best place to be sure they intercept/find the food.

I think the package recommended that you put one every 6 or 12 feet, can't recall. But I can tell you that they ate the stuff up. My neighbors were using the glue traps, but said that it was kind of sad because the mice struggle so hard to escape that they literally rip their skin. If you use the glue traps, you'll want to put some bait in them to kill them so they don't just sit there and starve.

Not sure what to tell you about planning to retrieve the corpses... hopefully you have enough access to get them before they smell up the house.

Good luck!

Answer 3

Mice In New House

Answer 4

No, the Pet Trainer idea is unlikely to work. Eventually, the mice will most likely come into the living part of your house in search of food. You should be ready to catch them when they do. Place the traps where you see their dropping, or where you see they've been into food. I've had great success with this live trap in my house:

http://veganstore.com/index.html?stocknumber=266

It’s also available for $2 cheaper here (although I prefer to buy it from the other place since I’m not a big fan of PETA):

https://www.petacatalog.org/prodinfo.asp?number=HP200

I've caught over a dozen mice with it so far and it can be used over and over indefinitely. Or, you can try making the free homemade humane trap described here:

http://www.helpinganimals.com/wildlife_livingWithMice.asp

If you do live trap mice, please be sure to check the traps several times a day and release the mice promptly, approximately a mile away from your home. It is much more cruel to allow a mouse in a live trap to slowly starve to death than to kill it quickly with a snap trap. When you release the mice, do it in an area with some sheltering bushes or plants. If you are a kind person, you might also leave a little bird seed or oatmeal for them, along with some shredded paper towel for bedding.

The absolute cruelest traps are glue traps. Mice have been known to gnaw off their own limbs and tear off their skin in an effort to escape, as they starve or dehydrate to death or suffocate in the glue. It can take three to five days for them to die. Poison isn't any better, as the mice die slowly and painfully from internal bleeding. It can take up to a week for them to die, and then they smell as they rot behind your walls.

It doesn't take much extra effort to be kind. You will feel better and so will the mice! Good luck!

Answer 5

Have you seen any signs of mice, like droppings or things shredded to make bedding? If not it doesn't sound like mice. Mice are also unlikely to stay in the attic, they want to live where food is. It's most likely expansion and contraction noises, the house cools in the night and contracts and then expands in the day when the sun hits it. It's particularly noticeable in new homes and with vinyl siding. It usually gets better with time in new houses.

Answer 6

Call an exterminator...otherwise go to a hardware store, they have mouse traps that you could put into the ceiling....

I've tried the sticky pads, but you have to throw them away once the mouse gets stuck...pretty disgusting

I prefer using the poison, this way the mice come take the poison, they usually go outside at some point & they remain out....the only thing you have to worry about is if they don't make it outside...you'll know by the odor.

GOOD LUCK!!

Answer 7

Just use a NO-KILL trap like HavaHart. Be sure to check the traps several times each day. After you capture the poor, little, innocent critters you can release them about a mile away from your home. They probably don't want to be in your attic/ceiling anyway.

Check havahart.com or victorpest.com for NO-KILL traps. Some hardware stores will rent them also.

Another idea: Mice are allergic to oil of peppermint and will not frequent a property where they can smell it. Place a few drops on a piece of cotton and set where you think the critters are staying. You will never see them again. Use the real “oil of peppermint”, not the extract.

Answer 8

My boyfriend had this problem being in the country. I hate snakes with a passion. But he bought a rat snake, or a corn snake and put in loose. It ate all the mice and then left the house. You will never see the snake because they are afraid of humans. They are completely safe. I personally would either call an exterminator or use mouse/rat poison and make sure the kittens don't get into it. Hope this helps.

Answer 9

There are noise makers for small pests, but that has never worked on the mice in my house, anyway. Usually some peanut butter in a mouse trap will get them every time. They make mouse traps now where the mouse isn't killed, only trapped until you decide to let them free near your enemy's - er, I mean - someone else's house.

Answer 10

Are you sure that they aren't possums? Either way, you got problems. I really think that those Pet Trainers are a waste of money and may actually drive your kittens crazy. I would board my kittens, or put them in a large pen in the yard so that they can't get to the poisoned rats, that will kill your Kitty's. Call a Professional, or put out rat bait, the kind that makes them look for water, so that they don't stink up the house. It really sounds like possums to me though, if it is the humane society will loan you traps to catch them. Either way, you'll have to protect your kittens