Gareth Branwyn is a freelance writer and the former Editorial Director of Maker Media. He is the author or editor of over a dozen books on technology, DIY, and geek culture. He is currently a contributor to Boing Boing, Wink Books, and Wink Fun. And he has a new best-of writing collection and “lazy man’s memoir,” called Borg Like Me.
Okay, so maybe this doesn’t fall under the “building a better mousetrap” category — more like “over-building a mousetrap with levels of digital control and electronic actuation that it doesn’t really need, but it’s a fun project anyway” category.
I heard an interview with the someone (the founder?) at the Victor mousetrap company. He had a few interesting comments. This is what I remember.
– Mice are surprisingly easy to catch.
– The company gets thousands of submissions every year for new types of mouse traps. Most of them are failures because of issues with size, cost, and especially disposal.
– Mice maintain a very small territory and often cover the same 10 foot by 10 foot space over and over again.
– Mice hate cheese. The will only eat it if they are extremely hungry.
RocketGuysays:
Mice love peanut butter. When we had a mouse problem at school, one of the kids simply put a spoonful of peanut butter in the bottom of a garbage can, and put a board to the rim from a nearby staircase. Mice smell the peanut butter and jump in for dinner, but then can’t get out.
We had many, many mice in the can come the next morning. Same kid had a snake, so at least the mice were “recycled”.
Gareth Branwyn is a freelance writer and the former Editorial Director of Maker Media. He is the author or editor of over a dozen books on technology, DIY, and geek culture. He is currently a contributor to Boing Boing, Wink Books, and Wink Fun. And he has a new best-of writing collection and “lazy man’s memoir,” called Borg Like Me.
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Nice job!
I heard an interview with the someone (the founder?) at the Victor mousetrap company. He had a few interesting comments. This is what I remember.
– Mice are surprisingly easy to catch.
– The company gets thousands of submissions every year for new types of mouse traps. Most of them are failures because of issues with size, cost, and especially disposal.
– Mice maintain a very small territory and often cover the same 10 foot by 10 foot space over and over again.
– Mice hate cheese. The will only eat it if they are extremely hungry.
Mice love peanut butter. When we had a mouse problem at school, one of the kids simply put a spoonful of peanut butter in the bottom of a garbage can, and put a board to the rim from a nearby staircase. Mice smell the peanut butter and jump in for dinner, but then can’t get out.
We had many, many mice in the can come the next morning. Same kid had a snake, so at least the mice were “recycled”.
-RG