[Dailydrool] Mouse

[Elizabeth Lindsey]

We've had trouble with snap traps not snapping. So last fall I  
invested in a $25 trap (Home Depot) that electrocutes the mouse who  
enters it. It's an instantaneous clean kill so the mouse doesn't know  
what hit it. No suffering. It's an expensive trap, but I love it.

We used a glue trap just once, under the impression that it had  
something in it that would kill the mouse. It was horrible seeing the  
mouse struggling on it. We forced ourselves to drown it because there  
was no way we could get it off the trap, and we didn't want it  
lingering for days so frightened and hurt. I will never, ever use a  
glue trap again. Even twenty years later, I still hate thinking about  
that poor mouse. We know better now.

And we now have young Charlie, who probably would try to catch a  
mouse if he saw one because he's sure interested in them when we go  
to look at them in pet stores. I don't want him to be catching mice,  
however, because they bite and you don't know what diseases they're  
carrying. Plus, someday I'd like to have pet rats again, and I don't  
my hounds getting confused over which indoor rodent is okay to chase  
and catch and which really, really isn't. Our Elsinore was wonderful  
with my pet rats. She was more interested in their food, actually,  
than she was in them. But Charlie may have a harder time with it.  
Perhaps when he's a little older and more mature. And perhaps pigs  
will fly, too. I think he's going to be young forever, even when he's  
a white-muzzled, arthritic fourteen-year-old.

Elizabeth