When worse comes to worst, place some cheese in a pizza box and wait.
That is exactly what College sophomore Ankoor Shah and his roommates did earlier this semester, hoping to trap some of the mice scampering about their room in Gregory College House.
But Shah and his roommates are not the only ones dealing with what seems to be an increased number of mice in Gregory this semester.
Although Gregory College House Dean Christopher Donovan acknowledged that there is a mice problem, he said that there has not been a surge in the number of complaints.
"I really hadn't heard more complaints than usual," Donovan said. "I haven't heard more than other college houses."
Donovan added that since the buildings that comprise Gregory are older buildings, complaints about mice are only natural.
"We always hear complaints," he said. "These are old buildings; we've got some mice."
Many residents, however, said that they have seen more mice in recent weeks than before.
Jennifer Jackson lives in Van Pelt Manor -- part of Gregory -- for the second consecutive year and said that she has noticed a significant increase in the number of mice this year.
"There are definitely more than there were last year," the College sophomore said.
She said that upon seeing mice "dart back and forth in the hallway," she and her roommates called maintenance and staff put down glue traps.
Maintenance workers "were helpful, but since [the mice problem] is so dorm-wide, you can't really do anything about it," Jackson said.
Engineering sophomore Teasha Katagiri said that since the mice infestation began, it has become necessary to keep the room extremely clean.
"We try to keep everything off the ground, so there's no crevices for them to hide," she said.
Donovan speculated that perhaps not all students who have problems with mice report them to maintenance.
"Maybe students haven't been calling them in," he said. "Or maybe it's just a few people that are having a really big problem."
Shah said that he and his roommates have never reported their mice problem to maintenance, but that their own homemade traps have been somewhat effective.
"Eventually we figured out where [the mice] were," he said. "We had to throw out a shoe that one of the mice had made a house in."
And there are other war stories of mice destroying residents' belongings floating around the dormitory.
Wharton sophomore Tarannum Rahman said that not only has she seen mice around her room at various times, but mice have chewed holes in her things, as well.
"When I got back from winter break, I had a bag, and it looked like it had been chewed through," she said.
Maintenance "came and finally set a trap, but we haven't caught it yet," Rahman added.
Donovan noted that residents often do not like to deal with disposing of the mice corpses, which is made necessary by the glue traps that maintenance uses.
"I think some students don't call specifically because they bring in the glue traps, so that might be some of the problem," he said.
Donovan also said that the construction along 40th Street, across the street from Gregory, has probably contributed to the any increase in the number of mice.
"Whenever there's a new kind of digging, we get a new kind of wave of mice," he said.
