Gross gross gross- we have a mouse plague in Melbourne

I was just about to say you need the Pied Piper but lemongrove beat me to it. Only do make sure you pay him or he takes the children!

When we lived in the Middle East, there was a plague of locusts one year. I’d come home from work to find that the buggers had eaten virtually everything in the mini garden I’d created out of desert and so carefully nurtured.

A friend was a nurse at the local military hospital and some of the local boys who worked there found it very funny to eat a live one in front of her, and see her ? face.
Traditionally a valuable food source, of course, but still....

I’ve just seen a video of mice on a farm in NSW. Oh, my stars! ? They give me the willies, all running around like that.

It’s the city area apparently but we are out near the Yarra valley wineries so not here yet. I do know that my tomatoes disappeared overnight and something stole my figs before they were ripe but I assumed it was one of our resident possums. I don’t mind them so much as they are native and have a right to their habitation.

I've seen no sign of mice where we are and there is a lot of open ground around us. Maybe as the weather cools we will see them coming inside from the weather. That is not uncommon. Is it really Melbourne that is having a problem? I know farmers are concerned about the damage and destruction to crops. poor farmers, have not had decent crops for years due to drought and when they get a good crop have mice to contend with.

Cats and terriers are totally overwhelmed when there is a true plague of mice they simply cannot keep up and basically give up.

There have been times during these plagues when people have put their bed legs in drums of water so that the mice could not get onto the beds during the night.

Interesting, Ellenvannin. I’ve never seen any reference to a similar phenomenon anywhere else. I know about the ?Monarch butterflies that migrate in the US but the thing we saw seemed different. The walls were black with the insects and our driver used an umbrella in front of us, to try and keep them away from our faces.

Eeeek! Still, there are many worse critters in Oz to have a plague of.
You need a Pied Piper.

I remember when clouds of moths filled the evening air one night in Sydney. GS's were screaming as the moths landed on us all, in our hair they were everywhere.
It was in the newspaper next day that the swarms of bogongs had come from Tasmania. They were big too.

I believe mice don’t have bladders they just wee all the time. How gross ?

I'm glad we decided to move back to the uk and not stay in Melbourne!

How about a flame thrower ? Fire is the only way to get rid of them.

Oh yuk! I don’t mind mice as such, but I’m not so keen on plagues of anything. Except maybe kittens. That would be ok. My cats would be useless at catching mice.

When we lived in Indonesia we had a plague of flying ants. Our driver had to use the wipers to clear the windscreen as he drove.

We also experienced a plague of butterflies and moths in Nigeria. That sounds as though it would be pretty but it was actually quite sinister. The moths were arrow shaped and very dark and looked like tiny bomber planes. They all left a horrible black dust everywhere and we had to put towels at the doors and windows to stop them from coming in.

We visited Australia in 2019, and loved Melbourne!

Buy or borrow a Jack Russell

Didn't the tennis players report mice in hotel rooms during the Australian Open?

CSIRO mouse researcher Steve Henry told AAP mice feast on the stubble of crops and reproduce roughly every three weeks once they reach six weeks old, making population control a near-impossible task.

They must have abundant food (cereal crops?) to multiply and survive in plague numbers. I think I'd start, right now, plugging all those gaps with wire wool!

Oh, how horrible, nanna8.
I suppose not as bad as rats but only marginally

Cane toads are horrible and they are poisonous too. I remember coming home one night in the rain and having to run across the lawn through loads of them.

I heard this overnight on the BBC World Service - really thought I was having a nightmare!

Sounds awful

We've got one of those as well Charleygirl seems to work ok. Not sure how effective it would be in a plague though .
We had three dogs and a cat and they all let a mouse run round the house unchecked. Think they thought it was another pet.

Hope the mice don't get to your area nana8 fingers crossed.

I remember we used often to have plagues of storm flies, tiny little black dot things that would completely cover a wall, thousands of the dratted things. It was quite mesmerising, the wall would look as if it were moving. We daren't leave any food out because it would become lost under a cloud of them in minutes.

I bought an electronic gadget on Amazon and it emits a loud screech which humans, cats and dogs can not hear but I have not seen a mouse here since I bought one and plugged it in.

My cat used to sit and watch the mouse and not get rid of it.

I like mice... I don’t like it when we have those greenfly in their millions They was a plague of locusts last year somewhere can’t remember where that looked awful

grandmajet

The mice had got into my neighbour's cupboards and chewed every packet in there.
One popped out of the fireplace so I had to fill in all the gaps.

I don’t ‘mind’ mice. As such. Then I saw a clip of on TV earlier with thousands of them running amok in Melbourne. Creeped me out to be honest! Wonder if they know what’s causing it?

Aga, I have a mental image of a hitman hiding behind a tree waiting to have a pop at a mouse!