Lawrence Hall, HSG
“Mate, There’s a
Mouse in me Billy Tea!”
Australia is suffering a plague of mice said to be of
“biblical proportions” ('You can't escape the smell': mouse plague grows to
biblical proportions across eastern Australia | Rural Australia | The Guardian).
Presumably the biblical proportions bit refers to the
plague, not to any given mouse.
The ten plagues of Egypt were water being turned to blood,
and then frogs, lice, flies, sick livestock, boils, hail, locusts, darkness,
and then the deaths of the firstborn.
No mention of mice, though.
Apparently a long drought resulting the many deaths of
natural predators has given Australian mice, as in the old adage, lots of play,
and play they have, reproducing like, well, mice and infesting homes, shops, cars,
restaurants, and crops, causing millions of dollars’ worth of damage.
Mice are cute only in Disney cartoons; in reality they,
their urine and feces, and the parasites they host transmit lyme disease, the
plague, the hantavirus, salmonella, meningitis-inducing bacteria, other lethal
diseases, and a catalogue of allergens.
Mice are of the order Rodentia (not unlike motivational
speakers) and must chew. If they don’t chew they die, and if they do chew (and
they must) then you might die. Their biting strength is such that they can chew
through electrical wiring, causing shorts that can burn down your house. They
can chew through residential gas lines, which also can burn down your house.
They chew and infect food in your pantry. They chew through plastic pipes, your
car’s wiring harness, wooden walls, and drywall. They might be living in the
sofa where your children nap and play and read.
When mice chewed into my car’s wiring – the insulation is
tasty to them, and useful for nests – I got myself a few barn cats to patrol
the area. They keep the mice population away and, unfortunately, enjoy the
occasional robin. A pet cat will in the same way provide security inside your
home. If in the autumn you see or smell signs of a mouse infestation, just
leave the pantry and closet doors open for a few days and nights – Tom will do
his job.
Sorry, kids, but Jerry and Tuffy need to die. It’s your life
or theirs. Like brushing your teeth, doing your homework, eating properly, and
receiving an occasional light touch of MeeMaw’s hairbrush, a mouse-free house is
good for you.
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