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[Garath]

I've got two cats and while the area seems to have a lot of mice, they leave my house alone. Snakes or anything that naturally hunts mice are fine too, as long as the scents get through the house etc. As for the mice leaving and/or starving, that depends. How close are alternative food sources? If they got nice safe nests in your walls and the neighbours provide more than enough food, or the fields outside provide, why would they leave or starve? I actually still get mice in the house. They're usually from neighbours, just passing through.

[Seriyu]

I'm sorry this took so long to respond to, I have been eaten by mice (no).

To describe where we're placing the traps, they're typically glue board traps, although we've switched over to a few live capture traps just to mix things up (They're big hollow "disc shaped" traps, in case there's more then one variety), they tend to catch mice fairly frequently. They both do often go close to the wall or around the corners of doors they've been known to exit from.

They've also started moving out of the back room where they pretty much exclusively stayed before we boxed up all the food, so hopefully they're starting to get starved out. Unfortunately deer scent is possibly not an option as we've got a dog (that's been house trained, but still), and we'd rather not have her marking. As a result a cat isn't really an option, and folk in the house dislike snakes more then mice.

Thanks again everyone! If we do starve them out hopefully the smell doesn't get too bad, because we really have no idea where the nest is. Current theory is (In the wall somehwere), then I realized that more likely it's under the house somewhere and they're just traveling through the walls. Not really in an accessible place in either case. 

[nenjin]

I don't know if mice are the same as rats in this behavior, but with rats, easy access to food is one thing that keeps them around.

That said, mice will eat just about anything, including insulation.

So in addition to the other stuff you're doing, I'd walk the perimeter of the property, and if you find where they're getting in, block it up. It don't fix the mice that have already made a home, but it will cut off access for new mice and prevent the current ones from getting food from outdoors.

[wierd]

Another factor to consider to limit/reduce rate of infiltration, is to make sure all flower beds, tall grasses, and ornamental plantings are at least 3 meters from the foundation walls of the home.

This forces mice to go into the open before they can get near the foundation wall, which the evolutionarily programmed not to do. Having "cover" near your foundation wall will radically encourage infiltrating pests, like mice and termites, to attempt to infiltrate your home.

[Darkmere]

Speaking of food... the ones in our house were feeding on a bag of butterscotch chips (cookie chips) that had fallen behind some shelving. Once we figured that out, removing the bag and baiting traps with their established food supply forced them into other open areas we had trapped. We got the grown family in a couple of days. It might be worthwhile to check low and/or dark areas of pantries to see if they have really easy access to food inside that might have been overlooked.

[Neonivek]

If you boxed away all the food and you still have mice it means they are gaining some source of nourishment you are unaware of.

If you can find what they are eating (assuming it isn't the house itself as is sometimes the case...) and prevent them from eating it... they will die off.

[Obsi]

Right now I have giant hobo spiders but when winter rolls around the mice in the fields outside will stop eating all the apples and mushrooms outside and come back inside.  They really do eat anything you don't put in rubbermaid containers.  They ate half a bar of irish spring hand soap last year, on top of an entire loaf of bread and a bunch of random other things still wrapped in plastic that you wouldn't think they could tell it was food.  Check all your cardboard box foods too they might have got into those.

[Facekillz058]

I've had mice get into canned food around my house, too, so don't think that will save you.

[Imp]

Another factor to consider to limit/reduce rate of infiltration, is to make sure all flower beds, tall grasses, and ornamental plantings are at least 3 meters from the foundation walls of the home.

This forces mice to go into the open before they can get near the foundation wall, which the evolutionarily programmed not to do. Having "cover" near your foundation wall will radically encourage infiltrating pests, like mice and termites, to attempt to infiltrate your home.

This.  And it's actually factor #1, according to professional pest control services, at least in the area where I live and work.

If you work in a food service business and call your pest control service because of a problem (they come once a month anyway for preventative maintenance, but if you see any sort of pest you call them immediately and they come that night), one of the very first things they will do is inspect the building.  They are looking for how the creatures are getting in, among other things.  And they will not leave until they have either found the entrance or determined that there is none (this can happen - a door could have been left open and critters get in that way, or even possibly someone could have maliciously released one inside your store... or it could have hidden in someone's belongings and jumped ship while the customer or employee was present (this is supposedly a really common reason for sudden cockroach infestations).

Fixing the points of access in is an utterly essential part of the fix.  There is effectively an infinite supply of critters 'outside'.  If those outside can get in, you could kill or remove every pest each day, and still have new ones the next day again, every day.

[Seriyu]

Okay, this is actually one thing I've not been sure of, how do you seal off a mousehole? Can't they just chew through whatever you bolt it up with (IE wood?)? I'm not really sure what to use in that case.

[Imp]

Sure, here's a quote from one of several sources about how to block off rodent access points.

Chances are you'll find several entry points in your walls, foundation or soffits. Fortunately, these gaps and cracks are easy to seal. For those smaller than 1/4 in. wide, acrylic latex caulk is a good filler because it's inexpensive, paintable and easy to apply (Photo 4). But acrylic caulk won't last long in wider gaps. For gaps and cracks 1/4 in. up to 1/2 in. wide, use polyurethane caulk. Polyurethane is gooey and more difficult to use than acrylic caulk, but you can smooth and paint it for a neat-looking job. Keep a rag and mineral spirits handy to clean up accidents.

Expanding foam is a fast, convenient filler for anything wider or for areas where appearance doesn't matter. It can fill gaps of any size but doesn't leave a smooth, neat-looking patch. And rodents can gnaw right through foam, so it's smart to stuff gaps with copper mesh before you add the foam (Photo 6). Conventional steel wool can eventually rust away. If you only have a few gaps to fill, buy a box of Chore Boy copper scrubbing pads from a hardware store or online. If you have holes galore, it may be cheaper to purchase a professional copper mesh product like CopperBlocker, which is available online. For most cracks, “minimal expanding” foam is the easiest to use (standard foam expands too much, flows out of the crack and makes a mess). A little overflow is no problem, since you can slice off the excess (Photo 7). For large or hollow cavities, standard full-expansion foam is the best (Photo 5).

http://www.familyhandyman.com/pest-control/how-to-keep-pests-out-of-your-house/step-by-step#step2

[aenri]

Are you using only glue-boards and that live-capture thingies?
Try using standard smasher mousetraps, loaded with something like peanut butter. I had problems with mice in house, so I bought one such trap and loaded it with bacon and left it in basement. BAM, after two weeks of use it had caught 12 mice. Well spent 50 cents.
Now I dont really have a problem with mice .

Bigger apartments and flats around here use rat poison for dealing with rodents.

[Lidku]

I suggest taming them, train them in the arts of war, and pit fight them with people around the world! You my friend will obtain riches beyong imaging from these pit fights.

[Grek]

If your dog doesn't like cats, why not get another dog to catch the mice? Terriers are bred to chase mice.

[nenjin]

Because there's nothing more annoying than a dog who can sense mice behind the walls but can't do shit about them except go crazy/scratch at the walls.