From what I've been reading, shrews don't do much damage to gardens and properties. In fact, if you happen to have one around it means that you have an exceptionally healthy garden. They are insectivorous and carnivorous, so I doubt that they have been chewing on the roots of your plants. Mice will sometimes do that. But are you sure that what you have is a shrew and not a vole? They look very much alike. Shrews are usually smaller than voles. And voles are very likely to go about chewing on roots, like mice.

I've had some unwelcomed visitors to our bird feeders too. I stopped filling the feeders for a while and went weeks without a sighting. I thought the hawk I'd seen and an orange cat who has been hanging out in our sideyard had taken care of the problem, and while I haven't seen a mouse I did spot one rat last night and there were two tonight. Not good. I was really hoping the natural predators were working and I am wishing the previous owner of the house next door (with a wooden deck off the back) hadn't gotten hysterical and killed any snake she saw (she swore they were poisonous, but they were common garden snakes -- just what you want to control other critters under that deck). I have two dogs and one would definitely go after anything she could. All our neighbors also have one or more dogs and a couple are older and/or small breeds. I hadn't even thought about one of them eating a poisoned rat before reading this. We also have a lot of squirrels and birds as well as all kinds of other critters in the area who could come around at night (possum, skunks, and raccoons are the most common, but we can get a fox, coyote, rabbits -- even a deer). I don't want to hurt or kill any of those (I would smell a trapped or wounded skunk outside my kitchen door too much for too long). We're in a severe drought here, so I hate to not feed the birds, but maybe I can move the feeders or scatter some seed near the wooded path across the street -- get it away from the houses. We had some mice that have not been seen for weeks now and they were definitely coming from the yard next door. I suspect they were living under the deck at the back of the house, especially since the previous owner got hysterical about snakes, thought anyone she saw was poisonous and had someone come kill anything she saw. The current neighbors are almost never home and are not maintaining their home and yard very well. I'm sure that isn't helping, but it also means I'm not likely to get much or any help or cooperation there. The rats are also seen going under the fence but also over it and up and down the tree -- which is probably how they have escaped my the visiting cat. I've seen a tail go down in that corner, but I don't know where they go from there. Our garbage is on that side of the garage, but in closed containers and in bags inside of that. The recycling is in open bins for now, but we will be moving to a wheeled cart soon. In the meantime, everything is rinsed and there are no signs of interest or activity around the bins. I looked at the Rat Zapper on Amazon -- seems less likely to attract birds, but do you think I'll get squirrels too? Any other ideas?

I'm glad it's working better. Windows Defender is a poor security program. It ranks very low when compared to other products when all undergo testing and performance assessments. Much better protection is available at no cost and maybe requiring only 10 minutes or less of your time to get and install. First choice - check the website of your internet service provider (or call customer service). Many furnish top quality security programs to customers for no charge. As an example, I get Norton (an excellent performer) from Comcast. Second choice - Look at the following link for ratings of free versions of security software. While I think these are maybe a step down from the paid versions of the same programs, all are better than Windows Defender. Choose one of the three from left to right for the top rated ones - Avast, AVG, Bitdefender. PC Mag ratings of free security programs Good luck.

The ears look a bit big for a House Mouse and the bicolored tail argues against this. It could be a Peromyscus species (either Keen's Mouse or a Deer Mouse - assuming P. keeni occurs in your area?), but what it looks most like to me is a Harvest Mouse (Reithrodontomys megalotis). Telling harvest mice from house mice is tough without looking for the grooves on the incisors.