Moving to Orkney

I may have mentioned before that we have a recurring mouse problem. I suppose anyone that lives in a very rural area i.e completely surrounded by open fields has the same problem.

Every year as winter approaches, so do the mice.

I hate killing them and would hope that the two pet cats that we have inside and the various visiting cats that we have outside that the mice would keep their distance, but no.

So we lay mouse poison. I know it probably isn't any more humane that traps, but I'm afraid I can't face emptying traps.

Anyway...

About four days ago, we were checking the bait stations and discovered that one of them in the bottom of the cupboard where the immersion tank is, was covered in small pieces of rubble. Strange, we thought. Maybe some rubble has fallen from one of the holes where the Rayburn pipework was removed from and into the bait station. This seemed an unlikely explanation, but good enough.

The next day, the station was topped up again with various bits and bobs, small stones, a nail, etc. Covering the poison!

Today it is indeed burried again. By now the mice? have run out of bits of stone etc and have used some insultation, fur, a twig, see picture.

How strange is this? It seems as though either the mice are burying the food (after all that's how they see it, it is patable) for later consumption. Or, there is a particulalry clever and benevolent mouse burying the poison to stop other mice getting to it.

Either way, it is very strange.

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