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Let me begin by saying, I have a kitty cat, who my husband and I love dearly! She was a stray, that found us and picked us, to be her caretaker, or chose us, to be her slaves....
the lord only knows where she came from...? We have several thousands of acres of forest that surrounds us and neighborhood with maybe 10 to 15 homes in the whole area, two others on our dirt road and immediate area.....
Someone likely dropped her off and dumped her, the only other option is there is a Lobsterman, that has a whole compound of buildings and barns on his property that sits back in, and off the road, about a quarter of a mile away that we have seen a whole bunch of different cats lounging in the sun near the road... maybe she came from there?
Well, my kitty LOVES field mice (and shrimp)(and rabbit).... the shrimp in Maine are tiny, popcorn sized shrimp, not like Florida where I used to Shrimp off a bridge near the condo I lived in, and could catch almost colossal sized shrimp right off the bridge at night! Yummy! But if she is from the Lobsterman's house down the road, then him giving the dregs of his fishing to all of his barn cats, would make some sense to her loving them....
Any way, we broke her from catching the field mice and eating the mice a few years back, thank God! But then she changed to just catching the field mice and then bringing them home, (through a window that she jumps to so to get back in if 'mommy kitty', moi, is not paying attention and checking the door for her majesty, that I usually leave opened, when she is outside in the summer....)
Well, all other mice brought in, the hubby and kitty work together to corner it, catch it, and then hubby releases it in to the wood pile away from the house.... a typical routine....
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She brought a mouse in, when I was not looking, the end of summer.... had to be summer, because I clearly had the window opened.... for her to bring it in, maybe I was taking a nap, or in the shower? I don't know?
Anyway, we could not figure out why she kept sitting in front of the pantry closet, for hours at a time, for weeks... the pantry closet with shelves we put in, is in Matt's mancave right off the kitchen, so I wrote it off to her just wanting to be near 'daddy kitty' when he was home from work??? stupid stupid me!
So Matt finally decided, something was wrong, can't remember what triggered him? But decided to take everything out of the pantry, and low and behold, on the ground, under the shelving, a mouse had a nice comfy bed made out of its of torn cardboard. What a CHORE and Nightmare, we had to go through everything, look for holes or openings to anything packaged and threw out half the pantry goods, just to be safe... the mouse likes pasta! and bit in to a beef broth carton for his liquid....
So Matt cleared out completely the nest and disinfected the pantry floor and all the scuzzy things that husbands are good for....
The mouse was never found.
HOWEVER, the bathroom off the mancave is where I have heard him... turns out, he fled to the cement enclosed crawl space below the house... he got in to the wall and flooring and crawl space by going through a tiny hole that the water pipes for our radiant heat, that come up from the crawl space, the heating unit is down there, plus the heating oil tank and water pump.... it's probably 3 and a half feet high down there.... we use it as storage....
I don't know what the mouse is eating now? we put everything in big plastic storage.
HOW CAN WE CATCH THE MOUSE WITHOUT KILLING THE MOUSE?
Let me begin by saying, I have a kitty cat, who my husband and I love dearly! She was a stray, that found us and picked us, to be her caretaker, or chose us, to be her slaves....
the lord only knows where she came from...? We have several thousands of acres of forest that surrounds us and neighborhood with maybe 10 to 15 homes in the whole area, two others on our dirt road and immediate area.....
Someone likely dropped her off and dumped her, the only other option is there is a Lobsterman, that has a whole compound of buildings and barns on his property that sits back in, and off the road, about a quarter of a mile away that we have seen a whole bunch of different cats lounging in the sun near the road... maybe she came from there?
Well, my kitty LOVES field mice (and shrimp)(and rabbit).... the shrimp in Maine are tiny, popcorn sized shrimp, not like Florida where I used to Shrimp off a bridge near the condo I lived in, and could catch almost colossal sized shrimp right off the bridge at night! Yummy! But if she is from the Lobsterman's house down the road, then him giving the dregs of his fishing to all of his barn cats, would make some sense to her loving them....
Any way, we broke her from catching the field mice and eating the mice a few years back, thank God! But then she changed to just catching the field mice and then bringing them home, (through a window that she jumps to so to get back in if 'mommy kitty', moi, is not paying attention and checking the door for her majesty, that I usually leave opened, when she is outside in the summer....)
Well, all other mice brought in, the hubby and kitty work together to corner it, catch it, and then hubby releases it in to the wood pile away from the house.... a typical routine....
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
She brought a mouse in, when I was not looking, the end of summer.... had to be summer, because I clearly had the window opened.... for her to bring it in, maybe I was taking a nap, or in the shower? I don't know?
Anyway, we could not figure out why she kept sitting in front of the pantry closet, for hours at a time, for weeks... the pantry closet with shelves we put in, is in Matt's mancave right off the kitchen, so I wrote it off to her just wanting to be near 'daddy kitty' when he was home from work??? stupid stupid me!
So Matt finally decided, something was wrong, can't remember what triggered him? But decided to take everything out of the pantry, and low and behold, on the ground, under the shelving, a mouse had a nice comfy bed made out of its of torn cardboard. What a CHORE and Nightmare, we had to go through everything, look for holes or openings to anything packaged and threw out half the pantry goods, just to be safe... the mouse likes pasta! and bit in to a beef broth carton for his liquid....
So Matt cleared out completely the nest and disinfected the pantry floor and all the scuzzy things that husbands are good for....
The mouse was never found.
HOWEVER, the bathroom off the mancave is where I have heard him... turns out, he fled to the cement enclosed crawl space below the house... he got in to the wall and flooring and crawl space by going through a tiny hole that the water pipes for our radiant heat, that come up from the crawl space, the heating unit is down there, plus the heating oil tank and water pump.... it's probably 3 and a half feet high down there.... we use it as storage....
I don't know what the mouse is eating now? we put everything in big plastic storage.
HOW CAN WE CATCH THE MOUSE WITHOUT KILLING THE MOUSE?
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