House Mouse
House mice are very common pests, but a few die hard rodent fanatics still keep them as pets. They are smaller and much less tame then pet mice however and best simply relocated away from human dwellings where they can live in their wild state.
House Mice (Mus musculus)
Description
House mice can be found in almost every home across the continent, but very few people consider them as anything more then pests. True they are not pet quality in the sense that they can be handled and played with, but they are fascinating to watch, and can give their owner a lot of insight into the origins of their common fancy mice. They tend to be about half the size of my domestic mice, and twice as jittery. Any sudden moves and they will disappear faster then the eye can see, and it may be several minutes until they finally poke their noses out to see if the danger is gone.
Diet
They can be maintained on a diet of rodent black and rat or mouse mix, but should get bits of fruit or veggies regularly. Cheerios or wheat bread are great treats, in small quantities. Do not feed chocolate, fried foods, salted foods, candy or junk food! I’ve also offered my gerbils crickets and mealworms as treats, which they seem to adore. Vitamins like Nutri-Cal are a good addition to their diet, and added calcium during nursing and growth due to demands on their systems at those times, but take care not to overdo it.
Water bottles should be offered, but you’ll probably need to place a water bowl in the cage until the mice learn how to use the bottle. To keep the water from becoming horribly soiled, use a wooden block about 1 inch thick, to keep bowl elevated off the cage floor. Ceramic or stoneware food dishes work well for keeping seeds or fresh foods off the floor, but a wire mesh hopper that allows the mice to eat the lab blocks through without them falling is ideal.
Habitat
As a rule of thumb remember that if your mouse can fit his head through it, his entire body can follow. House mice are particularly good escape artist due to their small size, and should always be kept in a 10 gallon tank, or similarly solid cage, with a tightly fitting lid. A ten gallon should be able to house about four to six house mice, including multi-level hiding areas and small toys.
A male and his harem of females can be housed together throughout pregnancy, birth, and family raising. But if left together with the male, the females can become pregnant again within two or three days after giving birth. House mice require multiple “hiding” places such as empty bathroom tissue rolls, cereal boxes, and other cardboard goodies that are often thrown away by mistake. PVC pipe tunnels work really well, as they can’t chew through them. Bedding should be aspen, paper based, or hay. Try to avoid Cedar or Pine.
Special needs
They need lots of hiding places, and an owner that will be quiet and slow moving when within their view. They panic very easily, and may take several generations of captivity before they begin to tame down enough to be handled. Fostering babies off onto tame domestic mice can greatly speed up the taming process.
Personality
- Attitude – Nervous, flighty, quick to run if they feel danger present
- Tame-ability – Bad to poor, unless fostered onto tame domestic mouse mothers as pinkies
- Trainability – Poor
- Activity level – High
- Vocal – Not unless very frightened Minimum owner’s age – 12 (if supervised by an adult, and youth understands that this is a ‘look but don’t touch’ animal)
Reproduction
- Lifespan 1-2 years, much less if left in the wild
- Maturity 4 weeks Sexual maturity 2-3 months
- Receptive 2 day cycle, post birth
- Gestation 18-21 days
- Infants show color pigment at 4-6 days
- Infants can be handled at 2 weeks, if mother is domestic and gentle. Wild mother’s will kill offspring smelling like humans
- Infant eyes open at 16 days
- Ready to wean at 4 weeks
Mutations
There are some mutations that occur in wild populations, but house mice can also be crossed to Fancy mice for color/type variety.
Pet Status
Although there are literally thousands of wild house mice in homes all over the states, very, very few of them are ‘pets’ in as much as being kept in a cage and cared for like a domestic mouse.
