Best bait for catching mice.

jill jackson

jill jackson

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Sep 5, 2006
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I trap mice here on the farm because, we don't like to use poisons.
What I've found works the very best of all is Little Debbie's Oatmeal Cakes I've used peanut-butter and bacon and it's good, but can't beat the candied oatmeal. Stays on the traps and the mice can't resist it.
What do others like to bait the deadly mouse trap with?
 
Peanut butter, meat usually with some fat, bacon,even pickled herring works ! My parents had one get into the kitchen stove insulation so they used prosciutto to catch their 'gourmet mouse' !!
Outside preditors help a lot , foxes etc.
 
Nutela....what kind of traps are you using? I put the Nutela on a regular sized wooden spring type trap. But I've been looking for something that might handle more than one rodent at a time.
 
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Self setting, even:thumbup:
 
Interesting trap. How does it work?
Click to expand...

A tube is supported over a bucket by a stick. Peanut butter is smeared on three sides of the tube. A plank is run up the side of the bucket. Mice climb the plank, and either lean on the tube or jump to it it get the peanut butter. Tube spins, mouse falls.

You can use water for drowned mice, or dry leaves in the bottom for a live trap (keeps them from jumping out.)
 
If using a have a heart trap chicken bones work good and unsalted sunflower seeds actually work pretty good.
 
Peanut butter works great in traps. Just a plain bucket with water kills them fine also. Just as long as they can't jump or climb out. The go in for the water and can't get out. Water doesn't need to be deep. They eventually die from hypothermia. That is a pretty cool setup though.:thumbup:
 
Well cheese, of course!

But if you want to get creative:

Easy mouse trap: One five-gallon bucket; one pound of greasy lard or commercial substitute; one jar of molasses; one pound of corn or other grain; one self-adhesive Velcro strip about 15 inches long; one .22 caliber firearm.
Grease the inside of the bucket liberally with lard (or greasy commercial substitute) so that tiny claws will not get a purchase. Fill bottom of bucket with molasses and grain. Fasten self-adhesive Velcro strip to the outside of the bucket.
The mice will climb the Velcro to get inside the bucket; they will drop inside to eat the molasses-soaked grain; hit them with a flashlight and shoot them. Ignore their cries of desperation. They will not be able to climb out. Empty bucket as needed.


Edit: Do not try to catch a mouse in a Have-A-Heart trap and move it to another location. First of all, it's illegal. Secondly, they will come back like homing pigeons, and getting rid of those is another thread.
 
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Peanut butter is my choice. You don't want or need a lot on the trigger, I only fill the inside of the little "curl" on the end. And be careful you don't smear any anywhere else, especially near the edges. You don't want them to lick the edge, spring the trap and get a free snack, you want their little head right next to the trigger when she goes. Been doing this for years, works like a charm.

Those home made bucket traps look like fun I'll admit, but the old standby just works too good. :)
 
Peanutbutter works for me every time. I set a trap this spring to get a nest of 'em. I set it at dusk. A few hour later, I got to wondering, but I didn't want to go out and look since the human activity might spook 'em. Then, I remembered my old night vision scope. It took me a while to get it set up and remember it all, but I finally got an image. But, there was a problem, some bright spot moving in the image. Then I remembered that gen 1 starlight scopes are very IR-sensitive. Could the bright spot be a mouse? Sure enough, I got to watch the mouse approach the trap, sniff the peanutbutter, take a bit, and get bit. Wham. And that was that. I went out and removed the body and reloaded and found another dead in the morning.
 
This thread is making me really hungry.

And I've got a mouse in my house, so I'll probably try one of these ideas.
 
For spring traps and particularly wily rodents, I've had great success with a ball of thread packed with peanut butter. I tangled it onto the trigger and caught a mouse that had been licking the bait off a hair trigger trap for a week.
 
Peanut butter is a great attractant but I've seen these clever little bastards with their clever little tongues lick the trigger without springing it. That's why I believe in hard cheese, they like it just as much but they have to work at it...and get their necks broke.
 
I like this trap best of the snap traps. Knead the ball of oatmeal cake into the bait hole and the mouse has to press down on the trigger to try to get at it. It's a fast trap and has a high catch percentage. It's easy to set and you can easily remove the mouse without touching it.
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