A New Mouse Trap

[Tim Coates]

I had a first experience today.  I found a LIVE mouse in a Kawai KG2C at
one of my universities.  The piano had been donated and previously
resided in a condo.  The piano had been at the school for about three
weeks and I was letting it get used to the shock of school life.

As I approached the piano I noticed some gray matter down by the bass
end tuning pins.  But this gray matter was moving.  It was apparent it
was a mouse.  I immediately opened the piano and tried to capture the
mouse.  This little guy was clever and dove for the action.  So, I had
to open the piano further and pull the action.  As I pulled the action
he was quite literally dancing on the hammers.  I tried to capture him
again and he dove for the wippens.  I was able to get him to move from
wippens to hammers and back, but I couldn't get a hold of him.  Finally,
he decided to stay in the wippens, which gave me a better plan of
attack.  I set the action up on its bass end, prodded the little critter
down the wippens towards the floor.  It was as if he was being prompted
to climb down a ladder.  Once he got down to  the floor, I lifted the
action and there he was just sitting on the floor.

A student scooped him up with a plastic cup and out he went to the foot
of snow we got this week.  He was rather fat, which makes me think two
possibilities:  he is a city mouse or he is a SHE and could have given
birth to a family in that Kawai if not found in time.


Tim Coates
University of South Dakota
University of Sioux Falls