How to Get Rid of Mice in Hoboken, NJ

First, make sure it is mice

House mice leave droppings no longer than a quarter inch, pointed at the ends, usually scattered along edges and inside cabinets. Rat droppings are much larger, closer to the size of a raisin or bigger, and tend to be found in clusters. If what you have looks more like the second, the advice below is not enough; read about rat control instead.

Other signs of mice: tiny chew holes in cereal boxes and bread bags, shredded paper towel or insulation tucked into a corner, and light scratching inside walls or ceilings after dark.

Use snap traps, and use plenty

Plain wooden or plastic snap traps are still the most reliable tool for a mouse problem indoors. The mistake most people make is setting two of them in the middle of the kitchen floor. Mice travel along walls and behind things, so traps belong there.

• Set the trigger end against the wall, at right angles to it.
• Put them behind the stove and refrigerator, under the sink and inside lower cabinets where you see droppings.
• Use a small dab of peanut butter or chocolate spread rather than cheese.
• Set more than feels necessary; a dozen in a small apartment is reasonable.
• Keep them out of reach of children and pets, or use covered trap stations.

Check them every morning. If a trap has caught nothing in a week, move it.

What does not work

Plug-in ultrasonic devices are sold everywhere and research has not shown them to drive mice out of a home reliably. Peppermint oil, dryer sheets and mothballs fall into the same category: a brief inconvenience to the animals at most. Glue boards catch mice but cause a slow death and are unpleasant to deal with; we do not recommend them.

Poison bait inside an apartment is the other common misstep. A mouse that eats it can crawl into a wall cavity to die, and in an old row house that cavity may be impossible to open without taking down plaster.

Close the gaps they use

A mouse can squeeze through an opening roughly the width of a pencil. In Hoboken apartments the usual routes are the holes where radiator pipes pass through the floor, the cutouts behind the kitchen sink and under the bathroom vanity, and the space around gas lines behind the stove.

Pack those openings tightly with steel wool or copper mesh, then cover with a sealant or patching compound so the mesh stays put. Foam on its own is not enough; mice chew through it. For the gap under an entry door, a sturdy door sweep makes a real difference.

Dealing with what you catch

Wear gloves, lift the trap into a plastic bag, seal it and put it in an outdoor bin. Most people do not reuse snap traps that have caught something, and at their price there is little reason to. Wash your hands afterwards even if you wore gloves.

Keep a rough count of what you catch and where. A steady drop over two weeks means you are winning. A steady number means mice are still arriving from somewhere you have not sealed.

Take away the easy food

Move dry goods like rice, pasta, cereal and pet food into glass or hard plastic containers with sealing lids. Wipe crumbs off counters before bed and do not leave a pet bowl full overnight. None of this removes mice by itself, but it makes the traps far more attractive than the pantry.

When the problem is bigger than your apartment

In attached buildings, mice move between units through shared walls, floor cavities and pipe chases. If you have sealed your own space, kept trapping, and still catch new mice every week, they are almost certainly coming from elsewhere in the building or from next door. At that point the fix involves the whole structure, which usually means the owner or managing agent needs to arrange it.

That is the kind of work Hoboken Rodent Control does most often: an inspection of the basement, the common areas and the exterior, followed by sealing at the points where mice enter the building in the first place.