Monday, December 17, 2007

A New pet? I dont think so!

Saturday night I was awoken from my sleep by my family to tell me that we acquired some new pests, er... I mean pets.

Duner went out to the Fridge we have in our garage to get a beverage, when he heard a noise. The kids soon joined him and located the source of the noise.

Our Dogs food bag.

We have 2 labs that stay mainly outside or in our garage, in the winter. We keep their food near the coop. We do have a storage container for it, but that is more effort to use in this cold weather than any of us want to fumble with, so we just open the bag and dig out their food when needed.

We feed them twice a day. Once in the am and once at night lately.
I had given them the usually nightly feeding that night. I noticed nothing.

The mice must have an internal clock and know when to hide out and wait.

It was 2 mice.

Both in the bag. Duner grabbed a empty milk gallon and tried to coerce them into the empty gallon. No takers for the first one. The kids said his butt was too big.

Need a bigger opening. Ok, so he grabbed the container we use to give the dogs water and gets one in. He actually got him to go right in!
The next one was a little more involved. The second mouse had fallen between the wrappers of the bag.

Those of you that don't know large dog food bags frequently have multiple layers of paper to keep the food contained. The second mouse had a hole in the bottom that they must have been using to negotiate a trail to and from the food source. He didn't want to come out of the layers but Duner squeezed the layers to make the mouse go in the correct direction.

Once both were in the water bottle the boys found a cover and sealed them in the container (since the mice were just about jumping up the 9 inches of the container!), to figure out what to do with them in the am, since they woke me up to ask me what to do with them and all I could say is 'I don't want them here. I don't care how they go away, just not here.' They were trying to tell me how cute they were. Did I mention it was around Midnight? Yes they are CRAZY.

No pets.

My thoughts briefly flashed back to my own experience with a mouse when I was 6 yrs old or so, I picked up a mouse that I thought was my neighbors hamster. It didn't appreciate me and bit me. It was squashed with a broom, so we were even.

Anyhoo, The next morning I woke and asked the kids about the mice.
Reece explained how Brock was worried about them so he put some water and food in the container so they would be ok overnight.
Yes, Brock was FEEDING the pests.

Reece went to go check on them shortly after that.

They were dead.

The water that Brock put in the bottom was a little much and they were FROZEN TO THE BOTTOM OF THE CONTAINER.

Great! Problem solved.

Thanks Brock!

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