Interesting Mouse Fact: Mice are not able to vomit (http://www.pestworldforkids.org/mice.html)

Death toll remains at 3 for mice...explanation to follow

Well, its been a few weeks since my last post but there is an excellent reason for the lapse in my writing.  The major reason is that I am now 100% certain that our vermin friends are waging chemical and biological warfare on my family.  In the last two weeks two various members of our family (myself included) have had near pneumonia, ear infections, flu symptoms, sinus problems, etc.  All of this happens to coincide with the start of our battle against our beasts.  Coincidence?  Perhaps but perhaps not.  If any of you are familiar with the writings of Douglas Adams you know that mice are assumed to be the most intelligent beings on earth.  I am beginning to agree with Mr. Adams' assertions. 

The Relatives

As I stated above, I feel the need to explain our death toll.  We have personally killed three mice. There has been one additional casualty I feel I must mention since I have felt for a while that we are battling more than just mice in our house.  My mother has a dog named Bonnie who roams freely around the property.  Bonnie is not the best at catching animals, she usually leaves that task to her partner/fellow dog Buck.  Bonnie is a bit loud and her run can only be described as more of a lumbering action.  Buck on the other hand is extremely agile and fast.  He also understands the value of stealth.  When Buck and Bonnie find a squirrel or other furry creature, they will dig at whatever hole the animal runs into with great enthusiasm and patience.  The problem Buck is constantly faced with is Bonnie's inability to shut up.  Buck digs and listens while Bonnie digs and barks - loudly.  Common sense tells us that if one is barking loudly while in pursuit of a very small subterranean creature, loud sounds will not help that animal to want to resurface.  Buck gets this, Bonnie does not.  So occasionally Buck is able to hunt solo and is usually very successful.  When he returns with his finds, Bonnie usually steals the dead creature and bites him if he tries to retrieve it.  This episode I am about to relay more than likely followed this pattern.  

I drove home from work on Friday and parked in my usual spot under one of our many trees.  As I was standing outside (weather in the 80's by the way) talking to my Dad I noticed Bonnie.  She was frantically trying to dig something out from under my car.  (As a side note, the car I drive many days is an 80's Porche which sits very low to the ground and is a piece of junk in my opinion - yet another blog I could write on my husbands' and my inability to agree on cars. Bright side is it gets great mileage.)  Back to the story.  Bonnie is laying down, trying to squeeze under the car and I knew she wanted something.  I leaned down and there under the car was a very large dead rat.  The tail alone looked to be 10" long.  Bonnie finally freed her treasure out from under the car and proceeded to carry it around all weekend. 

When I saw what the dogs had caught and how big the rat was, my worry that there is more hiding in the recesses of our house greatly increased.  My dad explained that the oat hay he is feeding the cows can really attract rats.  The cows get fed within yards of our house so it looks like we are now on watch for larger droppings that just the mouse kind.  Oh joy.