Rodent reality, tough tile & pipe types

KEEPING MICE OUT OF YOUR RIDE

How can I stop rodents from nesting inside my ATV? It sits in a shed over the winter. So far nothing that I’ve tried seems to have worked.—SAL DUNN, RILEY LAKE, ONT.

That’s because it’s very, very hard—according to almost every cottager, pest control expert, biologist, and ATV dealer we talked to. Completely sealing every opening in the machine itself is nearly impossible, says Mark Giesler of Giesler Marine in Powassan, Ont. “There are just so many places where mice can get in.” And we assume that storing the ATV in a building that’s more mouse-proof to begin with—a shipping container, for instance—isn’t feasible, or you would have done it already.

So you’re left with mouse-proofing the shed (blocking cracks and holes, covering windows with screening, eliminating food sources) and trying to get