Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Sorry if this isn't the best place for this post, but I wasn't sure where else to put it...

I need some recommendations on mouse breeding cages and heat/cold tolerant mice. Our collection has gotten large enough that breeding our own mice is becoming a necessity.

First, any thoughts that you may have on the most convenient, easy to clean, easy to service cages would be great. I don't want to spend a lot, but I'm willing to make a reasonable investment in something if it's really functional.

Second, I'm concerned about the range of temperatures that are likely to occur where the mice are likely to be kept. My garage is probably the best place for them. In the winter we normally have a few weeks with nights that drop below freezing. I'm thinking that I can use some heat tape and a thermostat. I'm guessing the summer is a bigger problem, with many weeks at or near 100 degrees F. I don't have a good solution for this other than "retiring" the herd every year as things warm up. Are there mice that are more hot/cold tolerant than others?

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance for your help.

Steve

Mice like room temperature. I'll post later in the day about mouse cages and how to care for them. I have about 200 mice and have raised mice for a long time.

Thanks! I look forward to your post.

Steve

Mice are expensive to buy so I find it better to raise my own. There are many strains of mice. Some are docile and some are nervous and wild. The all white mice are the most docile. You can lift them by their tails and they don't try to climb up themselves and bite you. I used to make cages out of sheet aluminum but now use Sterilite brand 16 quart plastic boxes. Mice don't chew through these. Make a frame from 1.5 inch X 0.75 inch thick pine boards. Make the frame so it fits over the top of the cage. Staple .025 inch hardware cloth to the top of the frame using small staples hammered in. Get metal grommets with 3/8 holes and place one near the edge of the frame. These are two piece grommets that are hammered using the tool that comes with the grommets together through the wire mesh. Get plastic water bottles with stainless steel tubes. I use pine shavings that are cheap for the bedding. Mice eat their babies unless you take precautions. Put one male and three females in each cage. Old females eat babies so get rid of them. Old is over one year old. More than two males in a cage will cause vicious fighting and the babies get eaten. Make sure there is always plenty of food in the cage or the babies will get eaten. I feed pelleted pig food, whole grains, and old fruit cheaply bought. Mice eat far more than you might imagine so be sure the food is there. I keep ball pythons to eat the surplus males and old females. Often when you put unacquainted mice together they don't have babies for some time. Sounds dumb but it is true.

Mistake: 1/4 mesh metal hardware cloth

Black mice are often wild so don't get them. Sometimes it is hard to buy good mice to raise. Look for mice that are stocky and roundish. The long thin mice are wild. Buy young mice because pet stores have old retired from breeders mice that are burned out. Cull out the wildest mice and you will soon have calm mice that are not afraid of you. They breed well. Buy 50 pound bags of grain and pig pellets from farm stores to feed. The cost per mouse will be low. You can get old bread but the nutrition level of bread is low. Well fed mice produce healthy snakes. I am fond of my mouse herd but no individual mouse so I have no problem feeding them to my snakes. The cost of the made cages is low. You can buy commercial used or new cages but be prepared to pay a lot. One you have a good colony producing don't introduce any new mice from the outside into the colony. You may introduce diseases.

Just thought of one more question. If I end up with surplus mice, what's a humane way to euthanize them before freezing?

Thanks very much ernestplutko for taking the time to go into detail with some great info. I really appreciate it.

When you mention that mice like room temperature, I'm assuming that you mean something like 70 /- 10 deg F?

Do you ever give them vitamin supplements? If so, what would you recommend?

Thanks again,
Steve

I never give them vitamins. The food I feed them has everything they need. Easily kill a mouse by lifting it by its tail. Holding the tail place mouse on a flat surface belly down. Put a pencil or dowel on its neck and lift the tail smartly and the mouse will instantly die with a broken neck. Mice smell bad but if you only have one adult male in each cage the smell will not be too bad because the males produce most of the smell in their urine. Mice don't like to be cold or hot so room temp is the best. Ask if you need more info. I only feed live mice.

I've decided to follow your lead and build my own rack. Based on what I have available locally, I've decided to go with Vision mouse tubs. I'd like to go with 10 or 12 tubs (2 tubs wide and 5 or 6 tubs tall). I'd like to keep 3 or 4 females and one male per tub. Assuming 5 mice per tub, should I go with the small Vision tub (12" x 7.5" x 4" or the regular Vision tub (19" x10" x 6"? The larger size seems like it might be better, but I'm concerned about the mice needing to reach up about 6 inches to get food and water. Is that a problem? Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated.

Steve

Just noticed your post. Go with the larger size. How are you going to give them water? Building cages like I mentioned work very well and cost little. Most of the commercial cages I have seen are for holding mice for lab work not for breeding.

Thanks for your reply. I did go ahead and order the larger tubs. The smaller ones seemed like they would be too small for four adult mice babies. I don't want to end up with dead mice because I overcrowded them.

For water, I purchased 12 small rodent drinking valves, a 3 gallon reservoir, tubing and hardware to plumb a valve to each cage. My only unresolved issue at this point is how to plumb the valve through the hardware cloth in each cage so that it doesn't interfere with the free movement of the tub if I want to completely remove it from the rack for cleaning. I suppose that I can leave enough play in the valve supply line so that I can just pull it up through the hardware cloth if necessary. I've also considered adding a 1/2" spacer between the hardware cloth and the rails supporting the tubs, but that complicates the construction quite a bit. Any thoughts? Thanks.

Steve

Send me your email address and I will send you a picture of a mouse rack I got from the internet. domoerno@wiktel.com

Sent. Thanks!

Hello,

Would you be able to post pictures of this sterlite cage so I can see what it looks like? I want to make some of my own.

Also, could you take a video and post it on youtube, or share it with me directly on how to kill the mouse with a pencil and lifting the tail. I want to know how to do that properly, so I don't have to build my own CO2 chamber to gas them.

Thank you again,

Justin

Just read you message. Please send your email address to domoerno@wiktel.com