About Pet Mice

Why Choose Mice?

• Mice don't cost much to feed and don't take up a lot of room, which are the most obvious reasons why people choose mice for pets. Mice also tend to be good choices for people who are allergic to dog or cat dander, as mice are less likely to provoke allergies. Mice are clean and don't give off a strong smell as rodents such as ferrets do. Mice are also friendly and intelligent.

Choosing a Mouse

• Some pet owners choose a mouse by looks. You may be attracted to black mice, blue mice or long-haired mice. However, other factors you should consider include how many mice to buy and what sex mouse you prefer. Since mice are social animals, many breeders recommend buying at least two mice. Some pet owners prefer male mice, finding them to be more friendly than female mice. If you intend to breed your mice, you'll need at least one of each sex. When buying multiple mice, it's fine to cage multiple females together, but multiple males housed together may have issues with aggression. To reduce or prevent aggression issues, keep males in separate cages. Introducing males to each other when they are young--about a month or less--can also reduce aggressiveness.

Feeding

• Mice will eat a variety of foods from insects to grains and vegetables. The least-complicated diet is special rodent food from a pet store. Brands of rat and mice pellets commonly available in pet stores include Kaytee and Nutriphase. However, even if you decide to feed store-bought food, you may want to supplement with occasional fresh food treats, such as peas or bits of apple. Some foods that are poisonous or unhealthy for mice are peanuts, chocolate, citrus fruit, onions, garlic and raw meat.

Housing Pet Mice

• Mice can live in small spaces, as little as one square foot per mouse. However, most mice breeders recommend about two square feet of room to maximize a mouse's health and happiness. Suitable cages can be made of plastic, wire or glass, each with different advantages and disadvantages. For instance, many mice enjoy climbing on the bars of a wire cage, but it is also the type of cage mice can most easily escape from. Glass tanks are difficult to escape from, but they must be cleaned more often than wire cages. You can use commercial bedding or shredded newspapers for the mouse cage. However, use of wood shavings is discouraged since the oils in the wood may irritate the mouse's lungs.

Handling Pet Mice

• Because mice are so small, it's easy to hurt a mouse with rough handling. The best way to pick up a mouse is to gently grasp the base of the tail with one hand, lift slightly and then slide the other hand underneath the mouse. Mice may be frightened of a hand entering their cage at first, but with repeated gentle handling, mice can be trained to voluntarily step into your hand. An effective way to train a mouse to voluntarily step onto your hand is to fill your palm with its favorite snack and wait for it to crawl into your hand. Eventually, once the mouse trusts you, it will not need the food reward in order to come to you.

Misconceptions

• Many people believe mice are dirty and smelly and carry infectious disease. In the wild, rats and mice may carry fleas, and the fleas may pass on disease to humans. However, domesticated mice bought from a breeder are disease-free and will not pass on illnesses to their human owners. Mice tend to be clean and odorless as well, cleaning and grooming themselves several times a day the way cats do. Most female mice give off no smell, but the urine of male mice can sometimes have a strong smell.