Bucket Spinner Live Mouse Trap

This is a live bucket trap for catching mice. I am currently using it in my attic and have caught 4 mice with it in a couple of days using peanut butter as bait. The mice venture out onto the spinner to get the peanut butter and then their weight causes it to rotate dumping them into the bucket. The sides are there to make sure they have to enter near the axis of rotation. My spinner vanes didn't print perfectly, they would be better if I printed slower, but the mice don't care. I probably could have made it over all a lot prettier, but it functions and it sits in my attic so …

To make it you need

A bucket

1 spinner

2 sides

2 filament clamps

1 circle aid

Some M3 bolts and nuts

To assemble this you need a big bucket. Poke a hole in the centre and use the circle aid to draw a circle on the top of the bucket. Then you can use the sides to mark where the flat parts should be. Cut out the hole in the top. Not the whole circle! See the picture. (Usual disclaimer here that sharp stuff is sharp so be careful.) You can install the two sides with what ever you have on hand. I used 3 M2 bolts for each side, marking and drilling the bucket top. But you could use hot glue or probably just a bit of filament jammed through holes. Drill two holes for the filament clamps (set for M3 bolts) on each flat part. Take a spare piece of filament thread it through the spinner it is the axis the spinner spins on. Insert it into the filament clamps to hold it in place. You might need to add spacers to keep the spinner centered. To do that I just cut a couple small pieces of PTFE tube (Bowden tubing) to act as spacers to centre the spinner. Make sure that it can spins freely, you might need to trim the bucket hole a bit.

Slap a little peanut butter on each of the spinner fins so that it is somewhat balanced and put the bucket some place that the mice can get in. I put it in my attic up against a truss so that the mice could use the truss like a ramp. If you wish your mice to stay "live" you need to check it regularly or put a little food in the bottom. Otherwise, well let's just say they get hungry and it isn't pretty.