Somerset Farmer Shares the Simple Fix That Finally Stopped Mice Destroying His Chicken Coop and Tractor Cab
"I was finding droppings in the feed bins every single morning. Went through traps, poison, the lot. Then my daughter told me about these pouches and I thought she was having me on."
Dave Pearson checking on his free-range hens near Yeovil, Somerset. Photo supplied.
Dave Pearson has been farming for over thirty years. He runs about 140 acres of mixed arable land and keeps roughly 200 free-range laying hens on his holding just outside Yeovil in Somerset. For the last few years, though, mice have been making his life a misery.
"It started getting properly bad about three winters back," Dave told me when I visited his farm last month. "You'd open the coop first thing in the morning and there'd be droppings everywhere. In the nest boxes, all through the feeders, on the floor. The hens were unsettled. Egg numbers dropped right off. I was chucking away feed every other day because it had been got at."
But the chicken coop was only half the headache. Mice had also set up camp in his tractor cab, his grain store, and the barn where he parks the quad bike and keeps his tools over winter.
"You'd sit down in the cab and there's shredded insulation everywhere. They'd properly gone to town on the wiring loom under the dash. My mechanic said he sees it all the time, farm vehicles sitting idle over winter. Cost me close to eight hundred quid to sort that out."
Natural, poison-free solution - safe around poultry and livestock
Why Mice on Farms Are Getting Worse
Dave is far from alone with this. According to the British Pest Control Association, rodent call-outs for agricultural properties went up by more than 20% between 2022 and 2024. Milder winters mean mice are breeding for longer, and modern farming equipment, with all its electronics and insulated cabling, gives them plenty of material to chew through.
- Chicken coops and nest boxes
- Feed bins and grain stores
- Tractor cabs and combine harvesters
- Tool sheds and workshops
- Hay and straw bales
- Electrical junction boxes
"I tried everything going," Dave says. "Snap traps everywhere, those ultrasonic plug-in things from the internet, even had the pest bloke out twice. The traps catch a few but there's always more where they came from. And poison - well, you can't be putting poison down where you've got chickens roaming about, can you? I actually lost a hen and the vet reckoned she'd eaten a poisoned mouse. That was it for me with poison."
Chewed wiring inside a tractor cab. Repairs like this can cost farmers hundreds of pounds each year.
The National Farmers' Union estimates that rodent damage costs UK agriculture around £20 million a year, much of it from contaminated animal feed and damaged machinery wiring. But for individual farmers like Dave, it's the daily frustration that really wears you down.
How Dave Found a Different Approach
It was Dave's daughter Lauren who spotted something online last autumn. "She rang me up and said, 'Dad, have you seen these repellent pouches? They're made from essential oils, you just leave them where the mice are getting in.' I thought she was having a laugh, honestly. Peppermint oil keeping mice out? Sounded like something off one of those daytime telly adverts."
But Dave was fed up enough to try anything. He ordered a pack of PRACTS HOMECARE Rodent Repellent Pouches and scattered them around the worst spots on the farm: two in the chicken coop, one in the tractor cab, two near the feed bins, and one in the barn.
How the Pouches Actually Work
I asked Dave to walk me through what he did, because it really is straightforward.
The key selling point for farmers is the safety angle. No poison means no risk to your hens, no secondary poisoning risk to barn cats or working dogs, and no worry about contaminated eggs or meat. And unlike traps, you don't have to check them, empty them, or reset them every day. You just pop the pouches in place and crack on.
A PRACTS HOMECARE pouch tucked near the nest boxes in Dave's chicken coop.
The Difference on Dave's Farm
"The tractor's been clear as well," Dave says, showing me the cab. "Popped one on the dash and one under the seat back in October. It's June now and not a bit of damage. My neighbour Keith, dairy farmer up the road, he came over and saw the state of the coop compared to what it was like. Ordered himself three packs straight away."
"Honestly, the amount of money I've wasted on traps and pest control visits over the years, and these little pouches for a fraction of the cost have done a better job than any of it. I feel a bit daft for not finding them sooner."
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What Other UK Farmers Are Saying
Pouches placed around a working farm barn. Each pack of 12 covers multiple outbuildings.
Common Questions From Farmers
Join thousands of UK farmers protecting their coops and kit.
No poison. No traps. No fuss. Just place the pouches and get on with your day.
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