I don't blame you for not wanting to kill it. I couldn't either. But I would throw out the dog food...just to be extra safe.

LOL, it happpens to me often, they get in the bird seed buckets, or the chicken feed, and I just pick them up by the tail and set them free.

I'm not sure I would throw out the food. Think about all the disgusting things dogs eat when they can!! How long could the mouse have been in there? Do you get food from that container every day?

It may have already died of fright. Seriously.

Can you dump the dog food out into a box on the ground outside? Mousie should run away. Don't give him the opportunity of zipping back in the garage.

How did the mouse get into the dog food container? Is IS a hardsided container, with a cover, right?

Hi dani, honey,

Take the bag out into the yard.

Take the dog, as well.

Having the dog close to you, and paying attnetion, tip the bag over to nearly horizontal.

Mouse will leave.

Dog has play time.

(If it were a cat, it'd grab it, partially immobilize it ... and play with it for an hour ... well, half an hour, maybe).

Get a screen with apertures slightly large than fly screen.

Screen the food, holding the screen at an angle ... food drops into a dish, below the edge of the screen ... the unwanted stuff drops onto a newspaper spread below the screen ... to be added to the compost heap.

On the other hand ... if you have a neighbour whose cat likes to play ...

... you know where I'm going with this ...

ole joyful

I wouldnt throw it away either......

Yeah, twice a day. DS fed them this morning so I'm thinking (hoping) it wasn't there yet. But, I did notice droppings and tiny little urine stains on a roll of paper towels next to the bin. Those are definitely out if here. That has to be how it got up in there.

Ok, all taken care of. I went back out and it was curled up sleeping in the scooper! I drug the bin to the backyard (away from the house) and put a stick in there. It seemed content to just stay put so I harassed it a little. It finally climbed out and ran. We'll let the food chain handle it from here.
It appears the Jack Russell is already on the trail. I thought I was tougher than that, but that stuff creeps me out!!
Once our cat brought in a mouse and let it go. FIRED!
Anyway, DH stuck Decon under the stove and said "muaaahh now we wait" or something like that. About a week later that cute little thing walked
out from under the stove, climbed into my slipper ( no foot inside) and
DIED!! I still feel guilty. I have to be nice now.

Joyful- you're funny and right. My cat might give it a half hour.

Guess we need a tighter lid.

Glad the mouse is now out of the food. Years ago my Mom opened the door from the house to the garage, where she keeps her freezer. The dog came out with her and suddenly ducked under the car. She came running out , chasing a mouse, put her foot down on it to stop it. Mom screamed, dog lifted her foot, mousie ran!

When our DS was very young I scolded him and his friends because they were always sneaking Milk Bones to our Westie from the box under the sink. Of course they denied it, but I was forever buying a new box of Milk Bones until they got tired of doing this. (I thought.)

Years later we decided to add a shower to the half bath behind the kitchen so that Teen Son could use that back BR. When the workman broke open the adjoining wall to access the plumbing, out poured dozens of Milk Bones. A very ambitious mouse had used the space around the kitchen drainpipe to steal the treats from under the sink and store them in the wall. There were no mice by this time, but a many-lifetimes-supply of food.

We had mice in a bird house, so DH puts some poison inside the birdhouse and a few days later we smell that unmistakable smell of dead mouse or rat. Don't want them around, don't think they're cute. But, from the smell of the back yard, they're in that giant rat hole in the sky.

Ok, all taken care of. I went back out and it was curled up sleeping in the scooper!

That sounds so cute, did you get a pic? :o)

Toss it. Mouse urine can carry Leptospirosis and most mammals can contract it including humans and dogs. It's not worth the cost of a bag (even a large one) of food. If it was human food you wouldn't think twice about tossing it. It's arisk since you don't know the ealth of the mouse or if it's urinated in the food. Most likely has so toss the food.

I had a pet mouse I rescued named Stuey for two years. They are very sweet and smart. I would never kill a mouse or ever use poison around so birds and other animals could get it.

hahahahhahaaha CHisue! I hope you apoligized to your son and his friends! LOL

Mice carry a certain type of tapeworm than transferes to dogs through the mice droppings and/or intestines.

(Ask me, and the Harry Dog, the incredible hunter of the edible mouse, how we know!)

He's Mr. Coyote in the fields. We see him jump straight up from all four legs, and then pounce down, front feet first on the mouse. It's all over in one gulp! If you've ever watched coyotes hunting mice, it's the same technique.

Any, not long afterward, Wes saw "something" on Harry's behind. Took it to the vet and learned all about the flea/mouse/dog tapeworm.

As my vet told me, this particular tape worm won't transfere to people.

So, if there are mouse droppings in the food; I'd ditch it.

If it's a big bag ...

... maybe skim off about 3 - 4" of the top to discard?

Surely the little bit of mouse urine produced each time (and drying between) wouldn't have gone below that level.

o j, o k?

We lived in a newer housing development in Corona, California when the kids were really little. Our washer and dryer were kept in the garage.

Every night all the dirty clothes would go out into a basket in the garage. Well, socks began to vanish. Into thin air. I would take two socks off each child every single day! Yet when they came out of the dryer there would always be one missing. I always just assumed that the pairs went into the washer and my dryer was eating them. Very odd. So I bought one of those large mesh bags for baby clothes. That is when I noticed that not all the sock were there! We found them- in a very very small hole in the drywall. Dh pulled it off one day and there must have been 20 socks in there. All we could see was a tiny bit of a sock poking through the wall!

Trish

Having been a cook once, you don't want to know what can go on in a kitchen, concerning mice. Having said that, I'm sure there's plenty of mice droppings in dogfood to begin with, as well as the occasional mouse.

Speaking of cats and mice and I have a sad funny story to tell you. When I was checking for Safeway in Enumclaw, a white blue eyed drenched cat came walking through the doors. We had a farm and I love cats so I put him in the car and took him home. Did I say we were run over with field mice? One day Snow was drinking out of a puddle and my husband called him and then touched him and Snow jumped a mile high! He was deaf! We would watch him waiting in front of the fridge for a mouse, we could hear under the stove! Come to find out somebody had him for a barn mouser, 2 farms over. Poor cat was starving to death, you'd think we'd know he was deaf, ever hear of a cat coming in an automated door at a store?