Okay couple of things on the topic of mice lots of traps and plugging holes are good starts, you can also get things that you plug in that emit a sound that repels rodants. If you are opposed to poison and they keep stealing the bait from your traps, try mixing plaster of paris with oatmeal and leave it places for them. The plaster hardens in thier guts and kills them so you don't have to worry about something else eating them and getting sick. As for the storage of vegtables in ones root celler I recomend trying to put things in sacks/net bags/old pantyhouse and hanging them from the roof of your root celler if you are haveing a rodant problem(do not use regular plastic bags things must breath, net or mesh of somekind is best)
. Other things you can do to make your house less attractive is keep a compost pile that is rodant accesable about 20 feet from your house this will seem very attractive to rodants in the fall and help prevent them from likeing your house as a place to live and a source of food for the winter. rodants love compost piles specailly if you use them all winter. They are warm and there is lots to eat for them and they help with the composting process there is no lose there. If you are keeping cats to help with the mice you want females as they tend to be better mousers then male cats.
