The Mouse in the House
Thumb sized and amazing spider wasI remember standing in the shared garden of a block of apartments at Gorokan watching a giant spider-hunting wasp.
First though, animals and people
It was as large as my thumb and had the most amazing purple wings and glossy black body. It had buzzed the full length of my body looking for any stray spiders and then moved off to hunt along the brick ledges around the gardens.
An old woman almost bowled me over. Silver hair and clothing flying she began to chase the wasp while firing bursts of fly-spray into the air from a can in her hand.
She must have feared and hated that creature. The fly-spray was held at arms length while her attack through the shrubs was a combination of ducking, weaving and hitting the huge bug with gusts of spray when it drifted into range.
Under the greenery that garden must have been a chemical desert where no spiders or bugs could survive!
Now I live in half a house and in the other half lives a woman. She works and has little to do with the yard apart from worrying when the lawn mowing guy doesn’t come for weeks and using the laundry that we share behind the house so I have the freedom to let things flourish as I wish. I appreciate that
The potted bromeliad garden around the garage is alive with gentle spiders of all sizes and varieties. There are possums living in the garage and there is a feeding table that is haunted by magpies, parrots and pigeons, kingfishers and miner birds. At night there are a few mice and big native cockroaches that feed at the leftovers on the tables and these are hunted by majestic owls that can be heard hooting and and muttering to themselves or swooshing off into the night . This year I was checked from head to toe by a great predatory spider-hunting wasp again. It was a very special moment to experience
My good neighbor does draw the line at me allowing mud-daubing and potter wasps to set up home in the old outdoor laundry we share and has me remove the nests if she sees them
So many people still kill off anything in their gardens that did not start life on a shelf in the supermarket or nursery.
A mouse appeared in the house
There was a barely audible, scrambling noise. The house is tiny and has a kitchenette off the main room which is just a bit of linoleum with a stove, sink and fridge . I looked around but the room is lit with a low energy lamp that shines on the desk. I saw nothing.
This went on for several nights.
The noise could have been the paper in the bin shifting. Sometimes it sounded as though the plastic shopping bags stuffed down beside the cupboard had shifted. Other times it was a repetitive sound as though the stove was creaking as it cooled or one of the speakers was on in the bedroom and making low crackling noises.
One night the lamp was aimed higher. The noises started again.
Like a periscope the head of a tiny mouse rose between the coils of the electric stove elements
The huge old desk I sit at is about two meters from the stove on my left. The desk faces the front of the apartment and is against a large window. The stove is a glistening white enameled box against the wall at the end of that same window so I am very close to it when I am on the computer as I was then.
The mouse was very obviously sizing me up. It must been doing it for days. It become used to me sitting here tapping away at the console without moving.
We sat and looked at one another for a few more minutes before the mouse calmly hopped out of it’s position among the stove coils and wandered across the surface of the stove and onto the stainless steel of the sink. There is a small drip pattern almost against the sink back where the ancient mixer tap outlet has developed a leak over all those decades and now has a permanent puddle of water at it’s base.
The mouse moved at amazing speed and in almost total silence. I heard it’s feet scrabbling as it lost traction for a moment and skidded across the stainless steel. It lapped at the puddle for a millisecond and in the half-light just seemed to appear back at the stove element and then disappear
Speedy Gonzales! I understand where that character came from now. It is the cartoon mouse representing all these speedy little varmints.
There seems to be a genetic trigger for situations like these. Mouse in the house? Kill it! It is strange to delighted and equally feeling the urge to kill.
I decided to make a few rules for the mouse and assess the situation. There is no sign on my sink or in my pantry that a mouse has been in the house. Nothing has been chewed. In the cupboard under the sink are a few mouse turds but they clean up alright.
I feel the mouse is not an invader coming to raid the house but is coming inside for warmth and to avoid the owls it has to face when it feeds outside at the bird table. The owls seem to be keeping the population down and there is no sign of significant infestation.
I decide to leave the mouse to get it’s drink and get warm but becomes an infestation or the house looks like being damaged or it attacks my food in the house I will put traps out.
A Bag of Mouse
Every night since then the mouse has done it’s little trek. The other night it went exploring some plastic grocery bags hanging on the kitchen wall above the sink. It went across the sill of the small window above the sink and jumped a few feet onto the lip of the bags.
Perhaps the bags looked like a safer path or it was more comfortable with the extra height from the floor. There was no other cover on the path it took to the water. It might have felt safer up the wall hidden behind something.
It landed on the lip of the bag and with its limbs flailing fell in. Shopping bags are spacious and deep when you are just not much more than a ball of fluff with feet and a tail. The bag jumped on its hook as though it was alive. The mouse’s body twisted frantically and it made herculean leaps from its depths. Mice are not silent! Furious squeaks rent the air.
Kerplop. It jumped out of the bag, mistimed the jump and missed the lip falling onto the sink below. It stood looking at me as though daring me to laugh. If it had longer legs it might have swayed but mice are low and very stable. I blinked and it had disappeared.
Indignant Little Visitor
The cleaner comes to help me around the house every two weeks and one night recently she had washed the dishes and stood saucepans on the stove so I could put them away. In keeping with her efforts that night I washed the plate I was using and upended it over the stove elements. There is not much space on the sink.
As I tapped away at the keyboard I heard a quiet but persistent squeak. It sounded as though the cooling fan in the computer tower was dying. It didn’t seem to be coming from the vents on the tower. The noise was getting louder and more insistent.
Slowly wandering about the kitchen I discovered the noise emanating from the stove beneath the upturned plate. The mouse had discovered its entry was covered and was complaining bitterly. You don’t expect that. The creature was in no danger and the dishes and saucepans stayed there all night.
The mouse has worked out the path through the bags on the wall to the sink for a drink. Often at night there is a moment when the paper bag on the wall rustles. Some nights you could hear the sound of little feet scrambling across the sink top. It even came out one night and played with a wooden peg left on the floor
I go to a little trouble to keep things cleaner there where the mouse walks and not just pick up cutlery that has been left out and use it. I figure the mouse has no sewers to get diseases and fleas in although I still don’t want mouse feet on my food or utensils. It will be living a short life feeding under the noses of the owls and if it causes me no drama I am happy to share!
(The image to the upper right on this page is the actual wasp mentioned in the story. It tore webs and smashed through the detritus along that window sill like a tiny machine. I have never seen anything so determined and resolute. Very pleased to have managed to take that image!)