How to keep your apartment free from mice and other critters
Last year was my first year living off campus. By September, I had moved in and was getting used to classes, and the people that I was living with were great. Everything was going well – that is, until I found a mouse running across the kitchen counter! If you are like me, cleaning is not a favourite pastime. Keeping your apartment or house clean is never at the top of the to-do list when there are classes, socializing, extra-curricular activities, and maybe a part-time job to deal with. To prevent or get rid of unwanted messes and critters, here are a few quick tips to keeping communal spaces clean that will save you stress and strain.
Keep your food out of the way of pests
This may seem obvious, but firmly sealing that opened bag of chips is a lot easier that picking up all the ‘gifts’ left behind by the house mouse. Make sure any opened bags of snacks, flour, bread, etc. are firmly sealed and stored in a cupboard, so it’s harder for animals to get to them. If you made lots of food for the week, put it in the fridge in sealed containers. If a few toast crumbs fall on the floor, wipe them up right away.
Clean out the fridge
Was that furry brown sludge once macaroni or lettuce? If it’s been there for longer than you can remember, throw it out. You can either do this with your housemates, or clean out your old food and politely ask about any of their dubious-looking items. Cleaning out the fridge not only makes it a nicer, less-smelly place, but also gives you more room to store food that you’ve been leaving on the counter, also keeping it away from critters.
Figure out a cleaning schedule with your housemates
Try to figure out a plan about what you need to clean and when. Try to do it as soon as possible, because the longer you leave it, the more uncomfortable you might feel bringing it up later on. A weekly rotation for cleaning the bathroom, kitchen, and other communal space gives everyone a bit of responsibility, without anyone feeling they have to do it all. If you and your housemates don’t like cleaning, or you feel like you’re always stuck with everything, a schedule will make it easier to stick to the task at hand.
If the mice won’t leave and no one is cleaning up
Get traps if you haven’t already. Even the cheap, old-fashioned mousetraps will do the trick. Usually they die pretty quickly, so it’s not as horrible as the traps that poison them. If that’s not your style, there are some options with treats that make the mice fall asleep. The only challenge now is to nominate a housemate to get rid of the dead or sleeping mouse. If that’s not 100 per cent effective, try to find where the critters are getting in and seal it off with tape, wood, or whatever you think is best. If that still doesn’t work, get a cat!
If your housemates haven’t been very receptive to a cleaning schedule, talk to them again. Really, it’s not as painful as it sounds. Let them know that you want to enjoy the space you’re living in – and you’d rather not have any little “friends” move in as well. You all have the same goals in the end; you can work it out.