I Smell Dead Things

Normally my three-animal cleanup crew works like a well-oiled machine.  Sparky the cat flushes mice and brings them inside either alive or dead.  If alive, Maggie kills the mouse.  Then Desmond eats it, crunchy bones and all.  Desmond's gotten into the habit of making a first-thing-in-the-morning circuit sniffing the floor looking for mousy, crunchy goodness.  I've gotten in the habit of not taking a single step unless I can see where I'm putting my foot, so I can make sure not to step on a dead mouse. We go through the drill 2-3 times a week.

Sometimes however, the mouse manages to crawl under something and die on it's own.  Nobody figures it out until a few days later when I walk through the kitchen and sniff, "Hm, there's something dead around here."  Three-four times this summer, I've nose-found something dead, behind a door, next to the cat litter, under a shelf, halfway under the refrigerator.

This time though, I think it's all the way under the refrigerator.  I've checked all the standard dying places and got nothing.  I pulled the fridge partway out and it's not enough.  I'm going to have to jack that puppy up and give it a good look-see.  First, I think I'll check all the other places I can think of - it'd really annoy me if I broke the fridge, and then found a mouse, say, in the back of a cabinet, or some other easy-to-get-to place.  I think Maggie the Mouse Killer is slacking on her job!