Mr Fleming, 78, had seen the like of the current masses of mice once before, in 1984. At first, though, he tried laying poison as did his neighbours but his German shepherd dog “started eating the bait faster than the mice”. His dog began haemorrhaging and needed urgent and costly care to be kept alive, joining a line at the local veterinary clinic. “The vets would have been been making a fortune in this little while,” he said. Rubber rings are another favoured method of trapping the mice, as on a farm near Inverell in northern NSW. Credit:Martin Bower The mice that did eat poison ended up decaying in the ceiling, within the walls and under the floor boards. “The stench was just unbelievable,” Mr Fleming said.