Australia ‘mouse plague’ sees rodents crawling into beds and biting occupants

Farmers in Australia have to put the legs of their beds in buckets of water to prevent mice from biting them while they sleep.

Millions of mice riot in the east of the country and cause great damage when they eat grain and attack grain silos.

The rodents have even made their way into hospitals and schools, forcing supermarkets to put food in sealed containers. Videos posted on social media highlighted the scale of the problem with thousands of mice frolicking on farms.

Xavier Martin, a grain farmer from Liverpool Plains, New South Wales, told The Telegraph: “People put the legs of their beds in buckets or pots of water, but the mice are still climbing curtains, jumping on their beds and biting them. ”

Mr Martin said the problem is primarily in New South Wales but has extended to Queensland and Victoria with various other hotspots.

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Speaking to today’s broadcast on BBC Radio 4, he said, “If they run out of food and they cannibalize each other, they refuse, but in other places they just explode and it’s not thousands of billions.”

“At my family farm, we put out two billion baits, mostly by air, and we are only medium-sized farmers and they are all gone, the baits have all been taken.

The extent of the problem became apparent after the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO) created a map called MouseAlert.

Through the website and app, farmers can report the sightings of mice in their area to follow up on the problem. A report on the website in March warned that the mice “will continue to breed in the summer / fall to peak in winter crops”.

Mr. Martin added, “In daylight you go out and may see few here and some there until you disturb them in the crops, in the paddock, or in the shed.

“But at night they just cross the street in both directions and when you stand still they climb on your pants, the outside if you’re lucky, the inside if you’re unlucky.

“If you drive down the road in the bright spots, you will only see a few pine skins on the road, but in some of the thicker spots you can barely see the tar, it’s just all fur.”

The scale of the problem has led the national government to apply for an emergency permit to allow a poison called bromadiolone for use. However, environmentalists have warned that doing so could harm other animals such as eagles that eat mice.