Best way to keep mice out of my car?

Different kind of rodents :laughing:

Mice with wings. And meaner faces. They are just plain creepy. I’ve had to do two removals from my house - living space, not attic.

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Many years ago, I had an apartment on the top floor of an old apartment building. We never figured out how bats got into my apartment, but the building was so old that there were a lot of voids.

In addition to being creepy, they can be deadly. The last incident (I made sure that it was the last, by moving out of that apt) was during the summer, when I woke up and heard a noise in the wastebasket near my bed. When I figured out that it was a bat, I stuffed a pillow in the wastebasket, and had the animal control people come to take it away.

They euthanized it, and sent the carcass to the state lab in Trenton. A few weeks later, I was informed that it was rabid. Just having saliva from a rabid animal come into contact with you can transmit rabies, and that thing was clearly flying around in my bedroom while I slept, so rather than taking any more chances, I moved from that building.

In the 6 years that I lived in that building, I encountered bats in the hallway at least 4 times, and there was one in my apartment on 3 occasions.

When I would inform the building superintendent each time, he always replied, “Yeah, the landlord has to do something about this”. But, the landlord never did. :enraged_face:

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On to my raccoon story. That’s why I put the shot gun in the trunk. Oh I’d better not. Pretty sure it was rabid or at least sick.

If you see a raccoon or a fox during daylight hours, you should assume that it’s rabid.

Had some racoons with canine distemper around DFW, same kind of behavior.

Yeah that was my feeling. I was at the cemetery watering flowers and the thing was under my car. I backed up and it waddled to the car again. So I put the gun in the car. I was president and didn’t want any visitors to encounter it. Called the game warden for an ok to shoot it but she wouldn’t return my call. Couple days later it was dead in the road.

Forgot about the gun when I went through the Menards lumber yard and they checked my trunk. The kid just mentioned it but that’s all. Everyone hunts in Minnesota.

As a side note, in Minnesota they will only test for rabies if there has been human exposure such as a bite. Otherwise you are just supposed to contain them to see if they go nuts or not.

“If you see a raccoon or a fox during daylight hours, you should assume that it’s rabid.”

In my very suburban neighborhood, with a good bit of parkland, we have frequent sighting of foxes in the daytime. A local naturalist informed the community that healthy foxes will sometimes be active during the day. A quick Google search gave many confirming hits. I would be wary of them, but not just because of a rabies risk.

(The only raccoon problem here was in the neighbor’s walls and attic. Many visits from the trapper/exterminator to resolve the problem.)

We had a mouse problem in our house. Freaked out The Wife. The pest control person said that the mice could get through a dime-size hole, and showed me where I had to plug up tiny holes in some cable entrances. Here’s a photo of one place after I plugged it.


and here’s what I found in that place before I plugged it

My 8th grade geometry teacher was a retired army colonel. He had stories. In one, he and his wife lived in a house on base at Ft Bragg. One night his wife ran down the stairs screaming about a bat in the bathroom. He went up there, and found a bat in the bathroom. He closed the door and got his tennis racket, then went back upstairs. He opened the door and served the bat into the bathtub. That was the end of the bat.

Yeah garage doors are my biggest issue. Those dang flimsy bottoms on the steel doors just don’t cut it. I’ve got three doors so I have installed that rubber threshold on the concrete along with heavy duty door bottoms from some door company to get a tight fit. Then the side weather stripping and in addition the metal rodent guards at the lower sides. In addition spray that rodent stopper once a month. Still sometimes. I can see daylight from inside.

Just a thought. if you use the wooden mice snap traps, you need to put one in the front and one in the back of each tire. they climb up your tires to get into the engine compartment and other areas of your vehicle.

Reminds me of Dan Akroyd and John Candy in The Great Outdoors. Dumb movie, but funny dumb as old SNL crews tended to be.

As mentioned above, bats are a protected species. I looked up how to safely capture them and get them back outside. This included a call to a local wildlife center. Interestingly, they can’t get into the air from the ground. They have to basically fall off of something and then they can get going in the air. The wildlife center said to get them on something like a hand towel and hang that up somewhere outside.

If was a bit nerve wracking due to the rabies concern. I wore my welders gloves, and helmet and I forget what else. But I know it wasn’t a wicker trash can and tennis racket.

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Well,that was about 90 years ago.

I got a car that had been parked in grass. I had it lifted to fix fog light issue and walked away and when I returned 2 baby mice were laying on ground under bumper area. Must have disturbed their hiding place.

Honda sells this to protect wiring from rodents:

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We drive the car almost daily. Mice still get in. I have found the mice chewing up one of the head rests in the back seat. They also made a nest in the blower motor. Only the one vehicle.