Best way to clean up after mice?

Just a couple hours ago, so ~9 pm my time, I noticed mice poop along one wall. I move some stuff and behold, more poo! It was late and my bird was already sleeping, so I vacuumed up the poop and then sprayed with vinegar and water. It's really late now so any further cleaning will have to wait until tomorrow. But will my bird be okay after I vacuumed up the poop? I'm going to scrub his cage tomorrow and move him so I can clean better.

Second question: should I switch from vinegar to a smaller amount of bleach and air out the room for a day or so? I'm not having an infestation, but there was enough poop to cause alarm tonight. On top of that my OCD is raging and I feel like if I don't take care of this now, at 12 am, my bird is in danger. Honestly I've had a long and tiring day and what I want more than anything is sleep.

Also, I removed my bird's water and food for the night, and will return them at dawn.

Although you don't list your location, your current time might put you around the Eastern time zone, but I don't think there's any present danger from the mice, though if rodent droppings were dried, powered & allowed to blow around, there could always be danger of a possible airborne virus, but I'd say waiting 'til morning would be OK, then I'd be interested in how best to remove your moochers.....mouse traps & a little bit of peanut butter has always worked well for me.....

If you live in the U.S., you can call your county agent or county agricultural extension office to be sure there is no local warning about any undue danger, locally, from rodents, to allay any worries you're having.....

You were right to remove the food & water, as that's what the mice would be interested in.....just washing the floor or other area with a soap, water & a little bleach should be OK & unless you use more than 1/4 cup of bleach in a mop bucket, you won't have any worries about odor.....bleach odor dissipates pretty quick, as does any surface residue.....

I live in Baltimore, particularly the countryside, if that helps at all. The droppings were dry. Should I call my vet to make sure he's not going to get sick?

By call I mean make an appointment.

It sounds like the problem has existed for a while. I would clean it up and keep a close watch on them before panicking. If they are not sick by now I would imagine they are fine. Keep it clean

Although you may have a problem with the thought of mice running around in your home, I really think that if there is no reported local outbreak of any type of rodent virus, simply keeping their droppings cleaned up, while you are in the process of getting rid of your visitors, will keep you and your feathered friend safe, however, if it would make you feel better, you could call and touch base with your veterinarian, just to ease your mind, though, as long as your bird has not been attacked, I think your vet will agree a phone call would work, rather than scheduling an appointment.....

I scheduled an appointment just in case. The vet said everything checked out, but he needed some blood work done anyway so I went through with it. One problem I do have is I had some toys in the mouse/mice's reach on the grating under the cage. I took EVERYTHING out and washed it all with vinegar, then rinsed with hot water. Is this enough to kill the nasty for his toys, or should I consider new ones? I'm hesitant to clean any of his stuff with bleach.

patch said:

I scheduled an appointment just in case. The vet said everything checked out, but he needed some blood work done anyway so I went through with it. One problem I do have is I had some toys in the mouse/mice's reach on the grating under the cage. I took EVERYTHING out and washed it all with vinegar, then rinsed with hot water. Is this enough to kill the nasty for his toys, or should I consider new ones? I'm hesitant to clean any of his stuff with bleach.

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That should be enough, but regular dish soap or bar hand soap is really very good a cleaning/disinfecting and unless a person has a condition that requires they use antibacterial soaps/agents, those are really overkill.

If you like to use bleach as a disinfectant, bleach dissipates relatively quickly and as I've mentioned, so does its odor.....you could bleach the toys, then wash them with soap & water, that way you wouldn't have to worry.....

Glad everything went well with the vet.....

The best advice I have is to be aggressive once you observe rodents. Mice are generally easier to control, but if you observe a rat or its droppings, do not delay the eradication process! Trust me, I speak from experience.

Good news! Last night Pepper and I slept downstairs, him elevated of course, and overnight we caught one! In our room, of course, after I'd spent the previous day vacuuming and dusting every stretch of space in the room, closet included. I checked again for any mouse droppings after catching this one and thankfully I saw none, but I cleaned a bit just in case.

I don't feel comfortable leaving the bird in his small cage anymore though, so I moved him back into his large cage. What I did was I centered him so that any further mice would head toward the snap trap than to him while I'm at work. Even though they're most active at night, you just never know. Tonight I'll remove the food and water again and we'll see if any others come out to play. Hopefully it was just this one...

Unfortunately I can tell you that there is more than one. Mice can have any where from one to 32 babies in a litter with the average being 10 to 14. Baby mice can reproduce as young as 5 weeks old and they are not picky, father or brother to sister daughter, mother to son they don't much care. Get traps down fast, once they get a good colony started your already in trouble.

We have traps set up all over the house, from the basement to the top floor where Pepper and I are. We're taking as many precautions as possible. Would you suggest we sleep downstairs again tonight?

labell said:

Unfortunately I can tell you that there is more than one. Mice can have any where from one to 32 babies in a litter with the average being 10 to 14. Baby mice can reproduce as young as 5 weeks old and they are not picky, father or brother to sister daughter, mother to son they don't much care. Get traps down fast, once they get a good colony started your already in trouble.

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Great advice! And consider yourself fortunate that they are "just mice" rather than their gigantic rat cousins.

patch said:

We have traps set up all over the house, from the basement to the top floor where Pepper and I are. We're taking as many precautions as possible. Would you suggest we sleep downstairs again tonight?

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Sleep where ever you feel most comfortable, the important thing is to remove or contain any and all food sources except what is in the traps. Check all your cupboards, cereal boxes and such, they are amazing at getting and chewing their way into anything. When you think you got them all, continue to set the traps for weeks because you didn't. One pregnant female is all it takes to start the whole war again. My dad lived out in the woods and this happen at his house, he was ill at the time and it took months for me to help him to get them all. We did eventually win but I grew to really despise them!

Understood! I don't want these little jerks around at all so I'll pass the info along to the rest of my family. We had no luck with the vector mouse traps because they were almost impossible to set off, but we got these other traps that snap with just the touch of a piece of paper. I'll go out and buy more of those. I'll remove all food and water from his cage overnight again to be on the safe side. Thanks so much for being around for this, you guys. My OCD is off the wall and it helps to have people walk me through my first mouse foray.

You should burn your house down. Then move. But don't leave a forwarding address. This will confuse the mice.

Not a nice situation you have there
Not seeing any certainly does not mean the problem has been resolved.

Very interesting link below

Mouse in the house? Here's how to clean up - DIY Life