A mouse in the House..

Saturday 1469 – 2nd June 2012.

On Thursday morning I heard a mouse in my kitchen, scratching away apparently underneath the kitchen cupboard beside the cooker. I grabbed Kisa my cat from where she was lolloping about in the sitting room! and put her in the kitchen, shutting the door. I stood watching through one of the glass panes in said door.  The cat sat looking bored; I stood patiently until I saw the mouse appear from under the old gas cooker, run around the floor and under the not working dishwasher ( you might be able to tell that I need a new Kitchen ) Kisa did nothing except sit and watch .. Hmmm 

 ( an aside –  I’m listening to the radio as I write this and just as I wrote that last bit I heard Jeannette Winterson, who is discussing her brilliant book Oranges are not the Only Fruit, talk about when she was young and mice used to “run around her kitchen” . What a coincidence !!!! )

Anyway back to the mouse. Shortly after it came out again and walked back round the cupboard, in and out of my shoes, and under the cooker again. By this time Kisa was lying down to watch the entertainment. Hopeless !!  I had thought Kisa would catch the mouse, I would grab her and put her outside, she would put the mouse down and it would get away ( I’ve done this before) or she would corner it in the room til I could put a glass jar over it and bring it outside..

Blast it didn’t happen.. So off I went to town and bought one of these –

It’s a humane mouse trap.

The idea is you place the clear plastic bit flat against the wall on the suspected mouse run, the mouse smells the bait in the round bit as it walks through the clear plastic tunnel, goes up the red ramp and once it’s in can’t get back out again until the owner of the trap pulls back the clear plastic cover.

You are advised to bring the mouse at least 1 km away to stop it coming back into the house!!

When I got back from town I couldn’t hear the mouse anymore.

Maybe it had gone out when I left the door open for a while or maybe the cat did get it and took it out?  No… the last one is unlikely as normally Kisa brings in mice she has caught (usually overnight) and leaves them at the bottom of the stairs as a gift for me. Nice!

So the trap was set and remained unused by said mouse Thursday night and all day Friday but I did hear the mouse Friday evening so I knew it was still there…

When I got up this Saturday morning Kisa redeemed herself  by sitting and staring at the folded up cushion for the garden-lounger. It was just inside the French doors which lead to the garden. She was staring in an alert, interested way I recognised as meaning “there’s a mouse in there!” I’ve seen that stare before, but it just didn’t seem to be working on Thursday! 

 I walked over and saw a hole in the top of the middle fold and there was a little face peering out. So what did I do…grab my camera of course and changed the zoom lens for the 18-55mm one, all the time watching the cushion to make sure the mouse didn’t get out and back onto the floor.  I waited for what seemed like ages but the mouse didn’t show its face just wriggled inside the cushion.

So outside the cushion had to go and me, with camera, followed leaving Kisa inside.

The mouse resolutely refused to come out.. I waited and waited. No joy. I couldn’t just go in and leave it. How would I know if the mouse was out or not?   I thought there’s nothing for it but to cut the cushion open to get the mouse out so that’s what I did. The cushion was veeeeery old and getting threadbare so it wasn’t a great loss and cheap enough to replace. There was much taking out of foam chips and  then watching as the foam chips vibrated indicating where the mouse was going to emerge next .

The photos below are the mouse peeping out and eventually allowing me to get very close to photograph it… isn’t it just the cutest thing!!

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After about 15 minutes of the photographic equivalent of a cat and mouse game the mouse got out and ran away under the hedge near the house.. Doubtless if it’s not already back in the house it probably will be soon.  As for the cushion it’s in the bin of course but I think I’ll leave the mouse trap down for a while !!

Saturday girl signing off .. see you next week.

 I also have a daily photography blog called Helen’s Photomania which you can find here I hope you’ll pop over and take a look if you haven’t already.