I Will Kill That Mouse

[Jeff Torrey]

I have had the car parked for a week in the garage. But did not put it away yet.

Great day for a ride. While driving I notice this smell, like anti-freeze. Then some smoke.

Take the car home right away. There is a d*** nest around the exhaust manifold.

So I get a pair if tongs out and clean it up. Lucky it did not catch on fire, it was mostly bits of paper towels and kleenex that I had in the garage to detail the car.

Mouse piss smells kinda like anti-freeze.

I may buy one of those car bags now, for winter storage.

One week and the little basteeeeeeeeeeerd ....

 

[Performin Norman]

I hate to say this but I put mouse poison pellets out in the garage. I don't want them eating up any wiring or vacuum hoses. It also keeps them out of the house. They seem to come in the garage first.

 

[Ulysses]

There was a blue and white that was bought on the East Coast recently and shipped into San Diego. It was brought to my Viper Tech to bring it up to par, since it had been sitting for a while. What the tech discovered under the intake manifold was a huge rats nest. He didn't say if there were remnants of the little buggers in there but he did say it was gross. I took a peek under the hood, and sure enough, they had made quite a comfortable home under there.

 

[Viper Wizard]

Those little monsters can do a lot of damage to a car!

SQUEAK SQUEAK

 

[viperprowler1]

I got my first Viper just before the fourth of July holiday in 1994. That fall, I was waiting for our new garage space to be completed and decided to store the Viper for the winter at my mothers house in a nice garage with a concrete floor. The next spring I prepared the car to come out of the garage. I fired it up, started like a baby and idled smoothly. As I am sitting there waiting for the engine to warm up, I noticed some of the gauges did not work along with the radio and the HVAC. I took the car to the dealership and the Viper tech removed the radio and found a mouse nest resting on top made of white cotton from a nice, white cotton towel from the trunk that I used to close the hood with to prevent hand prints. He had torn the towel up and carried the material all the way to the instrument panel and built his/her nest. The mice proceeded to chew all the wiring in that part of the dash and it caused all of the afore-mentioned equipment to cease functioning. The worst part was it obviously wasn't warranty repairs. I had to pay the bill but the Viper tech did a beautiful job and everything worked fine after that. Needless to say, the next fall the Viper went into my new garage space and no more mouse problems. Don't know why mice chew stuff that is not digestible...anyone out there have any answers to that question?

 

[Makara]

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Don't know why mice chew stuff that is not digestible...anyone out there have any answers to that question?

[/B]<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Being rodents, mice are blessed with front teeth that keep growing their entire lives. If the teeth are not worn down they will grow too large and kill the animal.

 

[JonB]

In my STORAGE ARTICLE (which missed the cut for VCA notes Fall) I warned: "IGNORE MICE AT YOUR PERIL."

They will chew wires, hoses, boots, and softer plastics, to keep their growing teeth sharp and short.

The former PIR-Pace Car, a Datsun Z, was destroyed by mice, and later sold for $1. David E Davis told a rodent vs Ferrari story once as well.....thatprovoked many horror stories.

If you do NOT have an Omni-bag or such, consider placing spring traps or a box of D-Con atop each of the control arms or tires of a stored vehicle. Place a masking-tape reminder on your steering wheel. Mice WILL transport the pellets into the vehicle, or their resting places underhhod. so keep the hood closed and the A/C-heater OFF before shutting off the car.

 

[Chuck 98 RT/10]

I doubt those car bags would help since rats/mice can chew through anything. D-con, traps or a good terrier would probably be the best defense.

 

[viperdoctor]

The glue traps with a single peanut in the middle make a delightfully, wonderfully, horrible way to kill these little terrorists.

Just place a few along the walls where they run around as they work their way to your car.

Make sure they are the extra large ones. If the trap is too small they may get out as they pull out their hair and limbs to escape from the glue. If the trap is big enough they will break free only to trap themselves again.

...now if they only made cat sized versions so my other cars that sit outside wouldn't be used as beds by the cats owned by negligent neighbors...

 

[jwwiii]

Hello;

Buy a "CAR CAPSULE" from PDK. These self inflating bubbles are great! Drive the Viper on the mat, hook up your battery tender to a surge protection strip, put a couple of D-Con traps in, zip it up, and plug it in. Not one mouse!

Seriously, one mouse can cause a lot more damage than the price of our VCA memberships. I learned about the bubble, the Battery tender, etc here on this site by your advice, and I thank you all!

No more mice!

Jim

 

[Vypr GT2]

Jim, I have held off getting a car capsule thinking I couldn't hook the Viper up to a battery tender once it was in a capsule. How do you get the power cord from the car to the wall when the car is in the capsule- does the car capsule have some sort of provision for that?

 

[Jeff Torrey]

John- I do not know. Better check with parts rack.

There must be a way.

But, as JonB said. Put out the decon and masking tape to help remember.

Car casule not mandatory.

 

[-RUNNR]

At first I wanted to chuckle....

But then I took a look outside. At the woods behind my house. And in the shed where I store my feeds for the animals....

Since then, I now have more mouse bait/traps laid around the Viper and IN the Viper than you can imagine.

I never thought about this being an issue. Too bad JoB's note didn't make it into VCA notes.

 

[Tom Friend]

I have found that the glue sheets do not work very well. Too often I find them with the peanut butter missing, with the glue covered with mousy fur. The little bastids were stealing all mu cheapo peanut butter, and kept coming back for more. Well, now I keep mouse traps with peanut butter in strategic locations around the garage and shop.
It is sooo gratifying to peek at a trap and find a dead mousy body there with the eyeballs bulging out.

Also, you must remember to keep anything resembling food out of your garage, or those rodents will set up shop permenantly. Remove dog food, bird seed, etc. or those lil buggers will keep coming back.

 

[Mark Young]

Here's a thought- go down to your local pet shelter and adopt an adult cat thats slated for put-down in the next day or so. Keep it in the garage and feed it once a day or every other day or so. You'll never have a rodent problem again and you'll feel good knowing that you saved a cat from the 'big sleep'.

If you don't want paw prints, put a cover on. The cost of the cat along with doing some good in the world is far better than spending all your time, energy, and money trying to combat mice with anything else. I grew up on a farm, and mice and rats were always a problem. I've seen every possible trap, poison, contraption there is - nothing beats a cat. They're tough too- just get em a warm place to sleep (a box with straw in it) and they'll be just fine out there in your garage all winter long.

And if you start to get a cat problem (we did), I've got a story about a great-horned owl I'll tell you about....

 

[Ulysses]

Ahhh! But there is something tougher than a cat! Coyotes. I always seems to lose cats to coyotes. Guess nature had to keep the cat population under control somehow.

 

[Mark Young]

Ulysses- That depends entirely on the cat. If you find yourself serving up your local pound kitties to your coyotes as dinner, simply upgrade the pound kitty to a mountain lion. Not only will you not have a mouse problem, you won't have a coyote problem either. See my earlier note about paw prints

 

[Ulysses]

I completely missed the line with the owl in it.

Come to think of it, there were some pretty happy, content looking owls hanging around.

 

[David Jenkins]

I've repaired 3 cars in the past year for rodent damage. Without a doubt they like the taste of the injector wiring harness. The materials must give off an odor or something. All 3 had the harness eaten. The last one was wild. Car had a horrible smell after the car warmed up. I figured the rodent was caught somewhere and was getting hot or stunk from just being dead. Removed the rocker panels and removed about 3 lbs. of dog food that had been stock piled!!! Both rockers were full of dog food and it was burning against the cats and mufflers!!! Have ya' ever smelled burning dog food? dj

 

[Vic]

Burning dog food! HA, thats a riot! I bet it smells worse than burning oil all over the botttom of a GTS! :^)

 

[Kevin ACR]

Buddy with a C5 says their forum recommends mothballs under the hood (in an open bag) to keep the mice away. I did 3 baggies half full, and hope it works. (and I did mark the driver window with a note to remove them in the spring).

After reading this I think I'll grab some glue traps as well. Just don't step on one, they are very nasty to remove from your shoe! They definately stick well.