coinman123
Silver Member
I had a lot of coppers soaking in mineral oil mixed with olive oil in my basement, in empty exposed pudding cups (super bad idea not having a lid). Last year I noticed that my cups got knocked over and there were mouse droppings everywhere. I picked up some coins from the table and put the coins in a sealed jar. I set snap traps and killed probably 15 mice, now the traps haven't been triggered for a year. Little did I know those mice stole some coins. Today I finally took the coins out of the olive oil and noticed I was missing a portion of coins. I checked in my coin album just in case I put them there, nope. I looked in the basement and to my surprise saw one copper 10 feet away from the where the table was, I ended up finding a total of 3 coppers. A Connecticut copper, a 1794 liberty cap, and an 1803 copper (not one of my EF-AU ones which were in my coin album, but a lower grade one). We are moving this year and I am guessing there are some more coppers under and behind stuff. I wasn't very through in searching for them, only spending five minutes. I am going to write down which ones I am missing, then spend huge amounts of time looking for them once the basement is empty. I just hope that those disgusting disease ridden things didn't drag any into the wall. I was really mad when I realized that my first copper was missing! My 1723 Hibernia! My favorite find ever, what really got my in to colonial relic hunting. My only guess is that the coins tasted like olive oil and they tried to drag them off. Mice and rodents are so gross, probably carrying many diseases! I washed each coin thoroughly now, and removed all trace of olive oil and mouse. At least my basement has been mouse free for at least a year now.
