South Australia mouse plague: How to control mice around the home
MICE have invaded our houses, gardens, paddocks and farms in plague proportions. Here’s our top tips to reduce their numbers around your home.
THEY have invaded our houses, gardens, paddocks and farms in plague proportions.
Increasing numbers of mice are making themselves at home in and on properties across South Australia.
The abundance of mice — the highest since 2014 — has been fuelled by high summer rainfall and a bumper harvest.
Latest research by the CSIRO and Invasive Animals Co-operative Research Centre shows mouse numbers are increasing across the northern Adelaide Plains, Yorke Peninsula and Eyre Peninsula.
Trap success at Mallala, 60km north of Adelaide, was at 75 per cent in March, while density estimates were between 250 and 320 mice per hectare.
Anything greater than 200 mice per hectare will cause economic damage to sowing crops.
Green’s Environmental Pest Services owner Robert Watchman, who has worked in the industry for 31 years, says he is finding, on average, eight to 12 mice in every house he visits.
Mr Watchman has been finding mice in houses from Gawler to Victor Harbor and throughout the Adelaide Hills. “This is the worst I have seen for a very long time in Adelaide,” he says.
THE MOUSE TRAP
Sunday Mail gardening writer Sophie Thomson shares some of her top tips on how to control mice numbers around the home.
1/ Exclusion. Stop mice getting in by sealing all holes and cracks around your home and sheds.
2/ If you have chooks and ducks, make sure you are not leaving out grain as this will attract mice. A good idea is to use a treadle feeder, which only opens when chooks stand on it.
3/ Store produce such as grain out of the mice’s reach such as placing it on an old metal bed frame (springs and wire) and suspending from the roof of a shed.
4/ Get rid of potential food sources. Store food in tight-fitting vermin-proof containers. Mice can chew through plastic so choose glass or tin. Leave kitchen areas clean.
5/ Chemical baits. It is really important to use these safely in a bait station to provide protection for children and pets as well as precious natural resources.
6/ Traps. There are several types — including snap traps and bucket traps — that can be baited with bacon, peanut butter, fish, meat, bread or chocolate.
7/ Cats can curtail mice but be a responsible owner and ensure they don’t kill native animals, too.