Strange, very strange....
A couple of weeks before Christmas, during The thoughtful Scotsmans weekend visit I went down to fetch my hiking boots from the shoe shelves in the basement. I was perplexed, to say the least, when I found them both half full of dog food.
Blaming Mrs Vl or TTS or my own daftness, I chucked the food in the bin and tried not to think anything more about it until after Christmas when I was faced with the same issue. This time I was fetching my work shoes, which I had with me in India so they had only been in the basement for a couple of weeks. Later on the same day, Mrs VL and Mum of All (our parents who art in Cork were visiting, more on that later) went through the whole shelf and emptied in excess of 2Kgs of food out of assorted shoes, mostly mine and my father in laws, and more right shoes the left. Even a couple of my wellie boots were full. TTS needn't worry, the couple of pairs of his working shoes that reside with us were left unfilled.
Further investigation found the source of the dog food, a careful hole chewed out of one of the sacks in Peggys food stash. The culprits are still at loose, detective work has led us to believe that it is mice (by the size of the droppings) although we find it hard to believe that they could move such big bits (it's dried food with sizable cubes (by mice standards)) and that they would take it upon themselves to hoard such a stash.
Since then a couple of traps have been baited and set and there have been frequent forrays by our resident predators. Almost certainly sending the cats down there issues little more than a warning, chances of them catching anything are slim, judging by previous attempts.
The problem has not repeated itself, but then it couldn't as we have removed the source of the food stash.
The garden before the snow falls,,,
15 years ago
6 comments:
Happy New Year.....and happy 33rd birthday Andy.
I recall leaving an old pair of walking boots in your basement in 2006 when I was last over. I'll remember to check for mouse poo / bodies before I put my feet in them again.
They do seem to like old walking boots, so you're right to be cautious....
There is a NEWS FLASH though, we've got on of the little sods. Extra Mature Jarslberg did the trick.... Just have to wait and see how many more of them there are...
We had problems with these delightful little animals in our little mews house in Kilkenny. One lived under our bed amongst empty boxes full of rustling paper for about 2 months, but I could never catch him/her. I remember hearing the crack as the trap went off, about 2am one morning. I woke up my dearest to let her know of my victory, and was promptly told to go back to sleep. We also had a whole family upstairs in the attic, and you'd hear a crack followed by a series of gradually diminishing thumps as the mouse gave up the ghost. We caught 20 or so, before they gave up and moved on!
Know the feeling, I think we've caught about 20 bin mice, 5 Garage mice, 6 Loft mice, and now 1 basement mouse.
Don't hear any scurrying over our heads at night now, so maybe we've got all the loft mice....
I still find it hard to belive that the job was done by mice. Did they have cranes or lift and tackle to get that lot into the tall boots? It beggars belief.
I still believe its squirrels, and the mice are the scapegoats!
Please look at our blog for a summary of the hols. I didn't mention the food filled boots as I knew you would.
I'm relieved to hear that it was dry dog-food they were leavin in your boots & not the other sort. That would make for a very unpleasant surprise on a cold morning.
Mice eh? Persecute the little bastards mercilessly . . .
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