The best-laid plans for ... mice! :)
Mice can be very cute but they become much less adorable when they sneak into your home and start eating your food, munching on your electrical wiring, your furniture, and endangering your health.
Unfortunately, rodents are excellent carriers of bacteria for some very dangerous diseases! In fact, rodents spread harmful bacteria through their saliva and fur.
It is therefore always better to get rid of these little beasts as soon as they invade our home environments. But how do you get rid of them without killing them?
1) Discourage mice from entering your house: Generally, the reason why mice enter homes is due to the absence of food in their natural environment and therefore due to hunger. If you keep your house clean and the food in tightly sealed containers even if rodents were to visit you, there would be no reason for them to stay.
2) Get a cat: If you can afford it in terms of space, time and money this could be a natural solution to rodents. Even the smell of a cat could discourage mice from entering your home, but if they come in, they will regret it once they are face to face with their natural antagonist. But be careful though, because if what you must fight is a house that is infested with rodents, then one cat will not be enough! Certainly, once the infestation has been eliminated, a cat will prevent a second infestation.
3) Peppermint oil: Peppermint is a natural deterrent against mice because its smell turns out to be too strong for their olfactory apparatus. Apply essential peppermint oil to a piece of cotton and rub it on the places where you believe "your" rodents enter your house -- and this will keep them away. Repeat this application every five to seven days to be effective over time.
4) Cayenne Pepper: Cayenne pepper is a type of red chili pepper, whose strong and annoying odor drives rodents away. Make sure you keep it out of the reach of children and other pets, but if you want to use it to drive out rodents then, put cayenne pepper in small containers in the closets, under beds, and near the presumed entry points of the rodents.
5) Dry snake excrement: it seems like dry snake excrement is a strong deterrent that keeps rodents away! You can find snake excrement by asking for it from a zoo or some acquaintance who has a pet snake at home. Rodents are hunted and eaten by snakes so rodents will not come near any location where they notice the presence of a snake! Again, remember to keep dry snake excrement out of the reach of children or other animals.
6) Buy a Trap: Among the traps that are sold there is a great variety and some of them do not kill the rodents but block and hold them so that they can be taken out of the house where they were caught and released some distance away (at least 1.6 km / one mile). Certainly, if your home is infested, then getting rid of one rodent will not solve the problem.
The important thing is to understand how serious the situation actually is, and if you realize that it is completely out of control, do not hesitate to contact specialists for help.
In conclusion, for the more daring, here is a video tutorial on how to build a homemade mouse trap!
