How to Control Mice in your Coopfeatured

by Petra on April 27, 2024

You feed your chickens cracked corn and grains. Chickens are not the cleanest eaters in the world and small bits are left behind. Consequently, mice are going to be attracted to your coop. You will have lots of them! When that happens, you need to have the tools to deal with them.

Chickens Eat Mice.

Chickens kill mice by shaking them, breaking their necks, and eating them whole. Contrary to popular belief, chickens are vicious and efficient hunters of small animals like snakes, mice, and voles. It is counter-intuitive to think that mice would be a big problem, but the fact is that mice are nocturnal animals and chickens are not. We have watched mice climb into the hen house at night and crawl around right below the hens with not a twitch from the chickens. The nighttime visitors can quickly get out of control especially if you have feed available in your coop.

Rat Poison Cannot be Your Solution.

Rat poison quickly and effectively eliminates mice and rats, but poison is not an option for you. The same poison that kills the mouse will get into your chickens if they find a dying mouse in their coop in the morning. We don’t use poison on our property for this reason. Poison is not only a threat to your livestock, but it can affect the local wildlife that feed on mice and rats.

Lethal Mouse Traps can hurt your chickens.

Glue traps are inhumane and are a danger to your chickens. Animals that end up in glue traps can be stuck for days and can be trapped in a variety of positions. The more the trapped animal tries to free itself, the more entangled it becomes with the glue. Mice and rats often resort to biting off their own limbs while attempting to free themselves. The animal normally dies from exhaustion or dehydration from their encounter with the glue trap, which can take days.

Using spring-loaded mouse traps in chicken coops can have several disadvantages. One major drawback is the risk of accidentally harming the chickens. Spring-loaded traps are designed to snap shut with a significant amount of force, potentially injuring or even killing a curious chicken that gets too close. Additionally, these traps can be challenging to set up correctly and may not always effectively capture mice, especially if the rodents are cautious or experienced. Moreover, the presence of spring-loaded traps in the coop can pose a safety hazard for both humans and animals, as they can be inadvertently triggered during coop maintenance or chicken feeding.

The Miracle of Humane Mouse Control Solutions.

We noticed our recent mouse problem after placing hay in the chicken run for the winter. The mouse problem was getting out of control when we decided to address it with humane traps. We tried some of the humane trap solutions sold at Tractor Supply Company, Lowes, and Home Depot. While they would catch mice, they would only have room for one or two mice. The trap was not scoring a catch every night and would never be able to keep up with the amount of mice we were seeing at night.

Then we discovered Shawn Woods. Shawn has built a huge following on YouTube with his vermin-busting solutions and experiments. He hosts a channel called “Mouse Trap Monday” where he uses a variety of homemade and commercial solutions to trap the little buggers. After watching him build a few traps using 5 gallon buckets, we decided we needed to reproduce some of his traps. They are able to catch large amounts of mice in a single night. We trapped and removed over 24 mice from our chicken coop over two nights using two of his traps!

The Rolling Pop Can Trap

The design is very simple and won’t cost you a penny if you have the materials already standing by. You will need the following items:

A 5-gallon bucket.
A wire cost hanger (the ones that Joan Crawford hated)
A pop can or beer can
Peanut butter
A ramp made of wood or some other material(about 3 feet long)

Building the rolling pop can trap is very simple. Just follow these steps:

Cut off the straight piece at the bottom of the wire hanger.
Empty the contents of the pop or soda can (if you haven’t already.) Using a drill bit slight larger than the wire from the hanger, drill a hole at the top center and bottom center of the soda can.
Drill two more holes near the top of the 5 gallon bucket, directly across from each other and approximately 1 inch below the top lip.
Run the wire through the holes you made in the soda can. The soda can should spin easily and freely.
Run the wire through the holes you drilled in the bucket to suspend the soda can over the 5 gallon bucket.
Smear peanut butter around the middle of the can.
Set the trap in the area of the infestation. Set up the ramp leading to the top of the bucket, parallel with the can. We taped ours in place, but it probably wasn’t necessary.

If you learn better with videos, please see this video posted by Shawn Woods. Results will vary depending on how many mice you have and how well you place the trap. The mice will climb the ramp and attempt to get to the peanut better you placed on the can. The mouse will fall into the bucket when it loses its footing on the can. The video below shows how our trap performed the first night.

Paper Plate Mouse Trap

Just like with the rolling pop can trap, the paper plate trap is very inexpensive and can be built with materials you probably already have:

A 5-gallon bucket.
A wire cost hanger
A sturdy paper plate
Peanut butter
A ramp made of wood or some other material (about 3 feet long)

Building the paper plate mouse trap is very simple. Just follow these steps:

Cut off the straight piece at the bottom of the wire hanger.
Drill two holes into the paper plate directly across from each other and splitting the plate into two sections – a larger section (about 70% of the plate) and a smaller section (about 30% of the plate).
Drill two more holes near the top of the 5 gallon bucket, directly across from each other and approximately 1 inch below the top lip.
Run the wire through the holes you made in the paper plate. The plate should flip easily and freely.
Run the wire through the holes you drilled in the bucket to suspend the smaller end of the plate over the 5 gallon bucket.
Connect a small string on the larger section of the plate on the bottom of the plate. This string will prevent the plate from going past 80 degrees when the trap is triggered and assist the plate in returning to the set position. Tape the string to the bottom of the plate and to the side of the 5 gallon bucket on the inside.
Smear peanut butter on the smaller end of the plate.
Set the trap in the area of the infestation. Set up the ramp leading to plate.

If you learn better with videos, please see this video posted by Shawn Woods. Results will vary depending on how many mice you have and how well you place the trap. The mice will climb the ramp and attempt to get to the peanut better you placed on the plate. The mouse will fall into the bucket when the mouse goes to the peanut butter on the plate. The video below shows how our trap performed.

Commercial Solutions

After experimenting with our homemade traps (which performed really well), we bought two commercially sold solutions to help with controlling mice long term. Both of the solutions we bought were highly recommended and have done incredibly well each night we have deployed them.

The Flip and Slide Bucket Lid Mouse Trap is sold by Rinne Traps. It performs similarly to the paper plate trap but prevents the mouse from getting to the peanut butter unless it enter the trap. We have caught numerous mice in our chicken coop and workshop using this trap.

We bought the Dizzy Dunker trap from Rinne Traps because the design was so cool! It performs similar to the soda can trap, but places an enclosure around the spinner that prevents escape. It has performed slightly better than the Flip and Slide trap, but both traps are superior products.