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mousetrap

 
Dictionary: mouse·trap   (mous'trăp') pronunciation
Home > Library > Literature & Language > Dictionary
n.
A trap for catching mice.

tr.v., -trapped, -trap·ping, -traps.
To trap or ensnare, as by a stratagem.


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How Products are Made: How is a mousetrap made?
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Home > Library > Science > How Products are Made

Scientists describe the mousetrap as a device that is "irreducibly complex." The mousetrap cannot be made more simply and still function, and, at the same time, it is so simple and does its job so well that it gives the illusion of being a profound achievement. "To build a better mousetrap" means to achieve an ideal, to reach a pinnacle of achievement, or to create the best possible device in an imperfect world.

Background

Traps as simple as pits dug in the ground have been used since humans began to hunt for food or to kill predators and vermin. The needs to catch prey and to protect the earliest settlements first motivated our ancestors to devise means of catching small and large animals for food and clothing. As early man learned to grow a wider variety of food and domesticate animals, trapping changed. Animals that raided farmyards, fields, and grain supplies had to be stopped, and the trapping of wild animals as a part of hunting became a sport, rather than a necessity.

More recently, animals have been trapped in the wild for medical research, although the most commonly used research animals—the laboratory mouse and rat—have been bred for this use. And city dwelling, heated houses, and stored food supplies have invited the "country cousins" of these laboratory animals to share our homes. When they feed, live, and breed where they are not wanted, traps, poisons, and the family cat have been used to keep their numbers down or eliminate them entirely.

The traditional snap mousetrap is a primitive device made of a combination of simple machines. It works—sometimes. However, it has enough flaws in design, operation, the process of baiting the trap, the resulting killing, and the calculated ability of the mouse to outsmart it that the objective of "building a better mousetrap" has become the inventor's watchword. Our culture has also evolved in its level of humanitarian concern and the desire to live trap even the most pesky animals so they can be released in the wild. The second major class of mousetraps that has been invented is the cage trap.

History

In 1895, John Mast of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, invented the snap-trap. Many other inventors had produced devices for killing mice before that date, but Mast's design was brilliant in its simplicity—and it had the advantage of not catching in ladies' long skirts of the day. Mast's simple trap enticed the mouse with a bit of bait held in a bait pedal and dispatched it with a striker that struck within three milliseconds of the mouse's fatal nibble.

Mast made a small fortune from his invention and sold his company in 1907 to Oneida Community Ltd. Known for its production of silverware, Oneida was also a manufacturer of steel traps that used its profits to supplement local fanners in what is now called Oneida, New York. Woodstream Corp. in Lititz, Pennsylvania, purchased the mousetrap business from Oneida, and, today, Woodstream manufactures up to 10 million mousetraps per year that are close cousins to Mast's original invention. Part of the beauty of the snap trap is its low price. In 1900, it retailed for five cents and, in 1962, it was still available for seven cents.

Many have followed in Mast's footsteps and have attempted to improve on his idea. Since 1838 when the U.S. Patent Office was opened, 4,400 patents have been granted for mousetraps, although less than 25 such inventions have made their creators any profits. The Patent Office has 39 official subclasses for mousetraps that read like an index of the Chamber of Horrors and include choking, squeezing, impaling, non-return entrance, swinging killer bar, explosive, and constricting noose devices. Electric mousetraps that dispatch victims with a shock, and various shapes and sizes of plastic and metal traps that conceal the mouse remains have been created but have not achieved commercial success.

In 1924, a janitor in an Iowa school witnessed an infestation of mice in the school. He turned his attentions in the evenings to building a better mousetrap in his garage. The resulting invention, called the "Catch-All Multiple Catch Mousetrap" would trap a mouse without killing it, allow its release, and could be reset for the next capture. A. E. "Brick" Kness went on to found Kness Manufacturing in Albia, Iowa. Today, Kness Manufacturing builds a standard snap-trap that has a plastic base instead of a wood one and the metal and plastic "Catch-All." The company is one of approximately three in the world in this industry and markets to 14 countries.

Raw Materials

The raw materials for the snap trap include pine for the base, a metal killer bar or striker that is driven by a 15-gauge coil spring, a thin metal rod called a trigger rod, and a bait pedal that is another small square of metal. Staples hold all the pieces together.

For the cage trap, sheet steel is used to form the basic box, and plastic is used to form the internal workings. Both materials are supplied by outside producers and formed in the mousetrap factory.

Design

The design of the cage trap is also relatively simple. The cage typically has six sides, and one of these is the rodent's entrance—but not an exit. Some cages have two inescapable entrances. Most are equipped with handles and with sliding release doors so the captured rodent can be released in the wild. The design lies in understanding the habits of the animal being trapped. A large but slow animal requires a cage made out of stronger materials, but the door mechanism can close securely but simply. For the wily house mouse, an inexpensive, portable, lightweight trap with swift-action doors is needed to capture it before it escapes. Ease of baiting the trap, its reusability (called repeatability), the number of animals it can capture and hold, types of construction materials, and other factors are design considerations.

The cage also contains a trip pan where the bait is placed. The trigger rod is attached to the trip pan so, when the bait is taken, the exit slams shut. The tension required to activate the trip pan and its trigger rod are set in the factory and are designed for the weight of the animal. Cage traps for mice are made of steel to limit opportunities for the animals to try to chew through wire.

The Snap Trap

The base of the snap trap is made of wood or plastic, depending on the manufacturer. Pine is used because it is solid and relatively inexpensive. Plastic can also be injection-molded with sites to hold the metal parts on the base, termed the mouseboard. The bait pedal is a small piece of die-cut metal with bait mount and a nub on it that allows it to pivot very slightly within the confines of its staples. The pivoting action releases the trigger rod and striker no matter how slightly the mouse moves the bait.

Some manufacturers use hand labor to assemble snap traps, however at least one maker has a fully automated process. In the automated process, copper-coated strands of steel are extruded and shaped into the trigger rod and striker. All metal parts are attached to the mouseboard with metal staples that extend through the mouseboard and crimped into the board so the pieces do not easily pull apart.

The Manufacturing
Process

The manufacturing process of the catch-all metal trap is described below.

  1. Sheets of galvanized steel are delivered to the factory for die cutting. The steel is termed "G90 Lock-Forming Quality" steel that is chosen for its strength characteristics and durability. The sheets of steel are precut into six different widths. Outside suppliers also deliver pellets of high-impact polystyrene for use in making the internal parts of the cage.
  2. The body, ends, lid, and paddle are all made of galvanized steel. The various widths of steel are run through dies specific to each width and trap part. These dies further cut, punch, notch, and form the pieces of the cage. The dies exert pressures ranging from 5-40 tons (4.5-36 metric tons), depending on their purposes. All of the metal piece parts go through the die machine.
  3. Meanwhile, the plastic pellets are melted in an injection molding machine that forms the pieces of the trip assembly. All of the metal and plastic pieces are transported by conveyor belt to the assembly line.
  4. The parts of the cage trap are assembled by hand. Operators at eight different stations snap the pieces of the body together first. The trip assembly is also snapped together and inserted in the body. The trip assembly operates because of a wind-up mechanism that also allows it to be rewound (that is, the tension is reset) and reused. At the last sequence of assembly, the trip is wound up and tested. One hundred percent of the cage traps are tested before they are placed back on the conveyor and transported to packing and shipping. The cage traps are wrapped singly and then packed in quantities for shipment and sale.

Quality Control

Quality control for the cage traps is intensive. Because the traps can be used many times, they must be constructed to last for a long time and to maintain their appearance. Each piece part is checked by hand before assembly, examined for cosmetics, and measured for exact dimensions. The line operators are responsible for rejecting pieces or partially assembled cages if they do not snap together properly.

Byproducts/Waste

There are no byproducts from manufacture of either type of trap, but most makers produce other varieties of traps for larger animals. Wood waste is disposed. Both metal and plastic waste are segregated and returned to their suppliers where they are remelted and recycled.

The Future

The future of the two most successful forms of the mousetrap—the snap trap and the cage trap—will be secure as long as mice are with us. Both the snap and cage traps have seen minor evolutionary changes, but, essentially, they are near-perfect inventions. Agriculture is becoming more limited in area but generating higher density production, so protection of harvested and stored crops from vermin is essential. In urban settings, more crowded living conditions result in increases in rodent populations, making traps a necessity. People are also more interested in saving the lives of the creatures they capture, so humane traps are increasingly popular in the United States and other countries, thus broadening the marketplace for American manufacturers. Competition in building the better mousetrap is limited except, perhaps, for that best mousetrap of all—the cat.

Where to Learn More

Books

Meyer, Steve. Being Kind to Animal Pests: A no-nonsense guide to humane animal control with cage traps, 1991.

Periodicals

Fenn, Donna. "A better mousetrap." Inc. (March 1985): 69.

Hope, Jack. "A better mousetrap." American Heritage (October 1996): 90.

Other

Kness Manufacturing Co., Inc. http://www.kness.com/.

"A Mousetrap Is Irreducibly Complex." http://www.ou.edu/engineering/cems/OKChE/jhh/Evol/sld038.htm.

Seabright Laboratories. http://www.seabrightlabs.com/mouse.html.

McGuire, Odell. "The Slidewhistle Mouse-trap." December 21, 1995. http://www.wlu.edu/-omcguire/mousex.html.

[Article by: Gillian S. Holmes]


Wikipedia: Mousetrap
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Home > Library > Miscellaneous > Wikipedia
For other uses, see Mousetrap (disambiguation).
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 It has been suggested that Rat trap be merged into this article or section. (Discuss)
A mouse killed in a mousetrap.

A mousetrap is a specialized type of animal trap designed primarily to catch mice; however, it may also trap other small animals. Mousetraps are usually set in an indoor location where there is a suspected infestation of rodents. There are various types of mousetrap, each with its own advantages and disadvantages. Larger traps are designed to catch other species of animals; such as rats, squirrels, other small rodents, or other animals.

Contents

Mouse trap designs

Spring-loaded bar mousetrap

A baited and primed spring-loaded bar mousetrap
Mousetrap, mouse, bait (chocolate)

The first spring-loaded mouse trap was invented by William C. Hooker of Abingdon Illinois, who received US patent 528671 for his design in 1894.[1][2] James Henry Atkinson, a British inventor who in 1897 invented a prototype called the "Little Nipper", probably had seen the Hooker trap in the shops or in advertisements and used it as the basis of his model.[3]

The traditional type was invented by Sir Hiram Stevens Maxim (who also invented the Maxim gun). It is a simple device with a heavily spring-loaded bar and a trip to release it. Stereotypically, cheese is placed on the trip as bait. Other food such as oats, chocolate, bread, meat, butter and peanut butter are also effective. The spring-loaded bar swings down rapidly and with great force when anything, usually a mouse or a rat, touches the trip. The design is such that the mouse's neck or spinal cord will be broken, or its ribs or skull crushed, by the force of the bar. Rats can easily escape from a mousetrap, so a larger version is used for them. Newer spring mouse traps have a plastic extended trigger made to look like a piece of Swiss cheese that is the color of American cheese.

John Mast of Lititz, Pennsylvania obtained an American patent for a similar snap-action device in 1899.[4]

Some modern plastic designs have the advantages that the trap can be set by the pressure of a single finger on a tab and that a dead mouse can be removed from the trap without touching the corpse.

Mouth mousetrap

A mouth-type mousetrap.

This lightweight mousetrap consists of a set of plastic jaws operated by a coiled spring and triggering mechanism inside the jaws, where the bait is held. The trigger snaps the jaws shut, killing the rodent.[5]

Electric mousetrap

This more recent type of mousetrap delivers a lethal dose of electricity when the rodent completes the circuit by contacting two electrodes located either at the entrance or between the entrance and the bait. The electrodes are housed in an insulated or plastic box to prevent accidental injury to humans and pets. They can be designed for single-catch domestic use or large multiple-catch commercial use. See U.S. Patent 4,250,655 and U.S. Patent 4,780,985

Live-catching mousetraps

A live-catch mousetrap. Uninjured mice can be released.

Other trap designs catch mice alive so that they can be released into the wild. It is important to release the mouse promptly – as mice can die from stress or dehydration – and at some distance, as mice have a strong homing instinct. Survival after release is not guaranteed, since house mice will tend to seek out human buildings, where they might encounter lethal mousetraps or may be eaten by predators. In the wild, house mice are very poor competitors, and cannot survive away from human settlements in areas where other small mammals, such as wood mice, are present.[6]

Glue traps

A mouse stuck in a glue trap. A mouse can be removed from a glue trap by pouring vegetable oil over it.

Glue traps are made using natural or synthetic adhesive applied to cardboard, plastic trays or similar material. Bait can be placed in the center or a scent may be added to the adhesive by the manufacturer. Glue traps are used primarily for rodent control indoors. Glue traps are not effective outdoors due to environmental conditions (moisture, dust) which quickly render the adhesive ineffective. Glue strip or glue tray devices trap the mouse in the sticky glue; users can free the mice from the glue by applying vegetable oil.[7] These types of trap are effective and non-toxic to humans.

However, death is much slower than with the traditional type trap,[8] which has prompted animal activists and welfare organisations such as PETA and the RSPCA to oppose the use of glue traps. Many mice eventually die from exposure, dehydration, starvation, suffocation, or predation, or they are killed by people when the trap is checked. In some jurisdictions there have been proposals to ban glue traps, or to legally restrict their use.[9] Other jurisdictions have banned their use.[10] In Ireland it is illegal to import, possess, sell or offer for sale unauthorized traps, including glue traps. This law, the Wildlife (Amendment) Act was passed in 2000.[11]

Bucket trap

Bucket traps may be lethal or non-lethal.[12] Both types have a ramp which leads to the rim of a deep-walled container, such as a bucket.

The bucket may contain a liquid to drown the trapped mouse. The mouse is baited to the top of the container where it falls into the bucket and drowns. Sometimes soap or caustic or poison chemicals are used in the bucket as killing agents.

In the non-lethal version, the bucket is empty, allowing the mouse to live, but keeping it trapped. The unharmed mouse can be released outdoors.

The variations are many with some being single catch and some multi-catch.[13]

Inert gas mousetrap

The RADAR mousetrap, invented by Rentokil Pest Control, kills trapped mice or other rodents with carbon dioxide, then notifies the user by e-mail so that the trap can be quickly emptied and reset[14]. Rentokil claims that the trap is painless and also reduces future mouse deaths by pinpointing the exact location of the trap and how many animals are caught so that their access can be controlled by sealing access holes. PETA has recognized this product as an "animal friendly achievement" [15].

Alternatives

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 This section does not cite any references or sources. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (December 2007)

Strychnine-soaked grain pellets were a common substitute for mousetraps for some time; currently they are rarely used because of the toxicity of the chemical, the inherent danger to children and pets, and the likelihood that the poisoned animal will die inside a wall or other inaccessible area where its carcass will be difficult to remove.

Similar devices

Similar ranges of traps are sized to trap other animal species; for example, rat traps are larger than mousetraps, and squirrel traps are larger still. A squirrel trap is a metal box-shaped device that is designed to catch squirrels and other similar-sized animals. The device works by drawing the animals by bait that is placed inside. Upon touch, it forces both sides closed, thereby trapping, but not killing the animal. The animal can then be released or killed at the trapper's discretion.

Mousetraps in literature

Reference to a mouse trap is made as early as the 1800s by Alexandre Dumas, père in his novel The Three Musketeers. Chapter ten is titled "A Mousetrap of the Seventeenth Century". In this case, rather than referring to a literal mouse trap, the author describes a police or guard tactic that involves laying in wait in the residence of someone who they have arrested without public knowledge and then grabbing, interviewing, and likely arresting anyone who comes to the residence. In the voice of a narrator, the author confesses to having no idea how the term became attached to this tactic.

Ralph Waldo Emerson is credited with the oft-quoted remark in favor of innovation: "Build a better mousetrap, and the world will beat a path to your door." In the June 1912 issue of The Philistine, Elbert Hubbard admits that his "kabojolism"[16] (a neologism coined by Hubbard to describe what a writer, "would have said if he had happened to think of [it]") was "a mousetrap that caught a lot of literary mice intent on orphic cheese."[17]

Mousetraps are a staple of slapstick comedy and animated cartoons such as Tom and Jerry, in which people commonly sit on the trap or have their fingers caught in the device.

See also

Notes

  1. ^ Patent of William C. Hooker's animal-trap in Google Patents.
  2. ^ http://www.nysl.nysed.gov/reference/patents/selected.htm Selected Highlights of the NYSL US Patent Collection
  3. ^ Van Dulken, Stephen (2001). Inventing the 19th Century. New York University Press. pp. 128. ISBN 0814788106. 
  4. ^ "Web reference". http://inventors.about.com/od/mstartinventions/a/mousetrap.htm. Retrieved 2007-08-30. 
  5. ^ Instructions for Mouse Traps - how to set and what bait to use
  6. ^ Tattersall F. H., Smith, R. H. & Nowell, F (1997). "Experimental colonization of contrasting habitats by house mice". Zeitschrift für Säugetierkunde 62: 350–358. 
  7. ^ http://www.peta.org/mc/factsheet_display.asp?ID=127 PETA Media Center, Glue Trap Factsheet
  8. ^ Article in About Home & Garden about glue traps
  9. ^ Regulatory Impact Statement (Victoria (Australia), 2005); Submission in response to the RIS
  10. ^ Animal Welfare Amendment Act 2008 (Tasmania (Australia))
  11. ^ Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government – Press Release "Roche acts against illegal glue traps"
  12. ^ Instructions on how to build a bucket mouse trap
  13. ^ [1]D. Gilmore, "A simple mouse trap." English mechanic and world of science, Volume XXXI. Page 185, item 17214. London:1880. Retrieved August 20, 2009
  14. ^ Mouse Pest Control: Rentokil's humane pest control options
  15. ^ PETA >> Campaigns >> Builder of More Humane Mousetrap Recognized as PETA's 'Person of the Year'
  16. ^ Elbert Hubbard (1998) [1922]. Elbert Hubbard II. ed. Preachments: Elbert Hubbard's Selected Writings, Volume 4. Montana: Kessinger. http://books.google.com/books?id=HfY3hmUPWaIC&pg=PA57&lpg=PA57&dq=kabojolism&source=web&ots=1fxDhPwywg&sig=sazVM8kmGdieYW2nhSqpzkMGmHg&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=1&ct=result. 
  17. ^ White, Bruce A. (1989). The Philistine: A Periodical of Protest (1895-1915). Lantham, Maryland: University Press of America. pp. 101–102. 

References

  • Tattersall F. H., Smith, R. H. & Nowell, F. (1997). Experimental colonization of contrasting habitats by house mice. Zeitschrift für Säugetierkunde. 62: 350-358.

External links

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Translations: Mousetrap
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Home > Library > Literature & Language > Translations

Dansk (Danish)
n. - musefælde
v. tr. - fange i en musefælde

Nederlands (Dutch)
muizenval, derderangs theater, in de val doen lopen

Français (French)
n. - souricière
v. tr. - mettre une souricière, piéger

Deutsch (German)
n. - Mausefalle
v. - in eine Falle locken, eine Falle stellen, mit einer Falle fangen

Ελληνική (Greek)
n. - ποντικοπαγίδα, φάκα

Italiano (Italian)
trappola per topi

Português (Portuguese)
n. - ratoeira (f)

Русский (Russian)
мышеловка

Español (Spanish)
n. - ratonera, trampa para cazar ratones
v. tr. - tender trampas, manipular,, enredar

Svenska (Swedish)
n. - råttfälla

中文（简体）(Chinese (Simplified))
捕鼠机, 诱饵战术, 臭干酪, 陷阱, 使落入捕鼠机, 诱捕

中文（繁體）(Chinese (Traditional))
n. - 捕鼠機, 誘餌戰術, 臭乾酪, 陷阱
v. tr. - 使落入捕鼠機, 誘捕

한국어 (Korean)
n. - 쥐덫, 신품
v. tr. - 덫을 놓다

日本語 (Japanese)
n. - ネズミ捕り器

العربيه (Arabic)
‏(الاسم) مصيدة فئران‏

עברית (Hebrew)
n. - ‮מלכודת עכברים‬
v. tr. - ‮לכד, ניצל בתחבולות‬

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Dictionary. The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition Copyright © 2007, 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2009. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.  Read more
How Products are Made. How Products are Made. Copyright © 2002 by The Gale Group, Inc. All rights reserved.  Read more
Wikipedia. This article is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Mousetrap".  Read more
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