Any of you spags ever raised an orphaned wild mouse before?

[East Coast Hustle]

I was doing some side work on my day off (from the bartending job I took for a month until we go back out to sea) cleaning out a storage unit and I disturbed a nest. Momma ran off with babies still hanging off her nipples. I found one baby still in the box the nest was in, alive and unharmed. It's got fur, eyes are still mostly closed but starting to blink open a little. I think they'll be open by tonight or tomorrow morning. So it's not a newborn, but it still needs a couple weeks of care before it's ready to be let go in the woods. I've done the appropriate internet research, but despite how many pet rodents I've had I've never had to nurse a baby myself. Anybody ever done this with a mouse or rat before and have any advice (besides the obvious jokes involving my nipples)?

[LMNO]

Sorry, dude. All I got are jokes about your nipples.

Hope things work out.

[Cain]

Er...if you put in the freezer, you can save it for when you raised an orphaned wild snake.

That's about the extent of my experience, sorry.

[Nephew Twiddleton]

It probably doesnt bode well for the mouse. If its eyes havent opened yet it hasnt really been able to learn much from its mother. You could perhaps feed it from a bottle but i dont know where youd get a rubber nipple the appropriate size and im not sure of the difference of mouse milk and larger mammals. I havent raised wild mice before- only pet store mice who had a litter. However since youve had pet rodents before you know that theyre curious and adaptable creatures. It may eat and drink what you give it out of necessity. The bright side is that if you decide to keep it it will already consider you a friend provided it survives. Good luck man.

[Anna Mae Bollocks]

If you can't find a proper bottle/dropper/whatever, twist a cotton handkerchief or cheesecloth and dip it in whatever mouse formula you can come up with, that could be small enough.
You probably saw this one already, it says to use kitten formula. http://www.thefunmouse.com/info/orphanedmice.cfm

Good luck.

[AFK]

I knew a guy who tried to raise an orphaned wild mouse before, it only ended in tears.

[Epimetheus]

I knew a guy who tried to raise an orphaned wild mouse before, it only ended in tears.

I figured it would end in a tail...

[AFK]

 


Well played sir.

[Nephew Twiddleton]

Mice are pretty fragile creatures too. You can actually kill them with fear- they handle accumulated stress very poorly.

[Kai]

ECH,

If you had found it earlier, it probably wouldn't make it. Once you get to fur and eyes open, you're in pretty good shape. Try feeding it with kitten formula from an eye dropper. I'm not sure, but you may also need to stimulate it to urinate and defecate, not sure. Once tried to do this with a mouse litter before the fur stage, and as said above, it only ended in tears. But I learned quite a bit in the process.

[Wyldkat]

Kitten formula works, so does goat's milk (for most orphaned animals, actually).  If you don't have an eye dropper, you can make a q-tip very wet and dribble it in, but be careful it doesn't catch any of the fluff in it's mouth.  Do not use cow's milk.  Try not to feed it on its back like you would a baby, but rather tummy town.  They tend to aspirate if you do it the other way.  It is probably almost old enough to drink from a small animal bottle.  Since the eyes are almost open it should be urinating/defecating on its own, but if you don't see signs of this, massage its bottom with a warm damp rag.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Kitten formula works, so does goat's milk (for most orphaned animals, actually).  If you don't have an eye dropper, you can make a q-tip very wet and dribble it in, but be careful it doesn't catch any of the fluff in it's mouth.  Do not use cow's milk.  Try not to feed it on its back like you would a baby, but rather tummy town.  They tend to aspirate if you do it the other way.  It is probably almost old enough to drink from a small animal bottle.  Since the eyes are almost open it should be urinating/defecating on its own, but if you don't see signs of this, massage its bottom with a warm damp rag.

Oh, look.  BH and Wyldkat are back.

How nice.

[Freeky]

Their board wherever it is must be dead

Good luck with the mouse ECH.

Welcome back to life, Roger.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Their board wherever it is must be dead

Seems to be a theme, right?  TCC, TSC, sooper secrut bord.

[Freeky]

Their board wherever it is must be dead

Seems to be a theme, right?  TCC, TSC, sooper secrut bord.

Yep, but that's the internet paganism for you.