Of all the awful, horrible, disgusting things ever.

[coldcupofjoe]

I came across a dead rat today. Not newly dead either, this thing was ripe. I would describe it but I can barely even think about it.

All the vomit, scat, and other various disgusing things I've come across, this was the worst.

I can't even think about it anymore or I'll throw up.

[ContraCorriente]

Where exactly did you find it?

[Irving Patrick Freleigh]

You'd be projectile vomiting non-stop if you had been at my store about a year and a half ago.

We had a big-time mouse infestation. The things were all over the backroom and even running loose on the salesfloor occasionally. Then they'd die in the backroom and not be picked up until the Orkin guy came by. There were some areas you could not stand to be in because they smelled so strongly of dead mouse.

Kind of a cute thing though--two girls from the salesfloor came across a mouse stuck in a glue trap (poor thing had bite marks on its foot from trying to chew it off), so they gave it a little water to drink and then set it free outside.

[coldcupofjoe]

Where exactly did you find it?

Top shelf in our backroom near some 3-4 year old food. Why we had food that old in the backroom anywhere, is completely beyond me.

We do have a problem with mice, but we use live capture traps and release them every day. Which I think is cool, but we should probably release them a little further way then the field right behind the store. I have come across a few dead mice but nothing like this.

[Reyneth]

We do have a problem with mice, but we use live capture traps and release them every day. Which I think is cool, but we should probably release them a little further way then the field right behind the store.

Yes. They are definitely finding their way back. You need to take them MILES away.

......I caught the same mouse several times at my mom's house until I learned better.

[ContraCorriente]

We used to have a problem in the spring with mice in our house. We lived across the street from a cotton field, so when they'd till it up or whatever they would do, it would run the mice out and into our house. Growing up, one of our favorite games was to get one stuck on a glue trap, then hide around the corner and jump out at it. We were pretty evil kids.

I found a rat a few months ago while helping clean out the basement of an old church. They'd had like a flea market kind of thing down there for the past few years, so all the clothes and stuff were still there. I picked up a shirt and there he was in all his dusty glory. All that was left was bone and some skin from his tummy. He also had a red ribbon in his mouth. I don't know why I remember this so clearly.

[Andara Bledin]

Kind of a cute thing though--two girls from the salesfloor came across a mouse stuck in a glue trap (poor thing had bite marks on its foot from trying to chew it off), so they gave it a little water to drink and then set it free outside.

Glue traps are vile and disgusting.

My work is on notice that if I ever catch a critter in one of the glue traps at work, I will be going directly home for the day.

One of the product specialists found part of the skin of a mouse that had hit a glue trap in his office. That is beyond gross.

Oh, and if you ever run across poison that says it'll make mice thirsty so they go looking for water? They lie. Nothing does that. They'll die in their nests, and you'll have essence of dead mouse to enhance your breathing experience for weeks.

^-.-^

[Becks]

Getting a few snakes will take care of the mice and rats. But, what'll take care of the snakes?

[SuperDan]

Getting a few snakes will take care of the mice and rats. But, what'll take care of the snakes?

Maybe this guy?

"I'm tired of all these motherfucking snakes in this motherfucking retail store!"

[Brighid45]

At my workplace we use powdered beets in one of our product recipes. Once I found a dead rat in an opened box of beet powder. We kept the boxes in the walk-in cooler after that--they had been stored in the warehouse with the grain-based dry goods, which was like handing each rat an engraved invitation to come up and sample the stuff.

It took some convincing for our cheapskate employer to throw away that box of beet powder. He wanted us to scrape off the top layer and keep on using what was left. :P

Years ago when I worked at a big chain department store (starts with 'k'), the boxes of candy bars in the stockroom were emptied out once a quarter and any whole ones left in the mouse-eaten boxes were sold off 5 for a buck. The Payday bars never got sold off--that magic combination of peanuts, salt and sugar was like crack for mousies. They'd make tunnels in the boxes. And somehow it was cheaper in the short run to pay us to go through the boxes and take a loss on the stock than to get an exterminator . . . *snort* No wonder that store went belly up five years after it opened.

[Ringtail Z28]

At Target the morons in management thought they could save a ton of money by not paying an exterminator to come in on a regular basis. That was a disaster, the rat problem got out of control in no time. Some employees, including me, had made a game out of who could kill the most rats. Management turned a blind eye to it until one guy beat a rat to death with a bat on the sales floor in front of customers. It got even better when stray cats started to show up in the store. The horrible stink that created made the backroom unbearable. Someone, probably in management started using rat poison to deal with the problem. Then they figured out that the smell of rat and cat carcasses probably wasn't so good for business and started calling the exterminator again.

[zzapp the witch]

On the topic of mice....I think I need to lay out poison again (I'd never use those glue traps, that's mean, I'll just kill the bastards, not torture them). I swear that last night, about 3am, I woke up with a mouse crawling under me in the bed. And I don't mean under the bed, and I don't mean under the covers with me, I mean inbetween my mattress and my memory foam mat that's on top of it underneath me. I couldn't wake up all the way, but I swear to god there was something moving underneath me.

I even looked under it this morning to see if there was anything squished under there, but there's not even poo. I still vacuumed it out and washed all my bedding.

Damned field mice. I feel slightly icky right now. I can't wait to be moved all the way into my house and not sleeping in the shop anymore.

[Naaman]

Oh, and if you ever run across poison that says it'll make mice thirsty so they go looking for water? They lie. Nothing does that. They'll die in their nests, and you'll have essence of dead mouse to enhance your breathing experience for weeks.

I can say that the same poison (it's warfarin) works wonders for squirrels in the attic

[Bella_Vixen]

Once upon a time at the garden shop, a mouse was caught in one of those live trap box deals. Good, right?

Wrong.

By the time someone got around to checking the traps, this mouse had turned into pudding.

[Broomjockey]

We had those live capture traps in my first theatre. Though I don't know why. One time I found a trap with a live mouse in it, management took the trap and threw it in the mop sink and drowned it. I think they wanted to minimize grossness in front of the customers.

However... they REALLY REALLY REALLY REALLY REALLY needed to check those things more often. Because one time (different from the other) I told them about a trap with a mouse, and while they were disposing of it, they opened it and found the partially eaten remains of another mouse. That's right. The one mouse was in there, died, then got nibbled on by another mouse that got stuck in there.