Limited choice for food

by MiceOwner01 Tue 10 Dec 2019, 12:39 pm

Mice in my area aren't a common pet and there aren't a lot of food for mice sold in my petstores. The one that looked the best out of all the ones I've seen in the shops is the Reggie rat and mimi mouse food by tiny friends farm. Would this be suitable for mice?, the other foods here are offbrand sunflower and corn mixes and that doesn't look suitable at all.

by Robin~ Tue 10 Dec 2019, 4:34 pm

Hello!

I think Mimi Mouse could work alright as a base for nutrients, however, I would try to supplement it with some smaller seeds if you can, such a as millet, flax seed, chia seed, and/or oats to improve the variety. This food is still rather corn heavy, but I know from helping others in situations like these that TFF foods, despite their reliance on pellets and corn, aren’t half bad compared to most.

I would try to add in the smaller seeds to the main diet so you get a stable GA reading. This article has a good calculator within it and a good explanation of GA calculating:
http://hamsterhideout.com/forum/topic/102287-hamster-nutrition-iii-calculating-the-guaranteed-analysis-of-a-mixed-diet/#entry1053176

Or, if you just want help from me directly, I’d be very happy to lend a hand!

Hope this helps!

by MerciToujoursMaPetiteBoop Tue 10 Dec 2019, 6:35 pm

Reggie & Mimi was the third "base" food I tried when April was with me. She had long since refused to have anything at all to do with the bland lab block stuff. Then we tried Brown's Tropical Carnival, only for April to develop a highly selective attitude to the variety of pieces in that. Finally I bought some Reggie & Mimi, and once again April refused to eat some of the pieces -- I picked all the corn out, but she wouldn't touch the green wafers or those dark gray cylinders either.

I believe April was a difficult case when it came to eating mouse food because I was, for all of her intents and purposes, her "giant mouse", and she watched me for her cues on what to do. If I didn't eat that stuff I put in her bowl, then she wasn't going to eat it either. She wanted that stuff she could smell in my mouth, and sometimes she would climb up onto my collar, sniff-sniff-sniff, pull down my lower lip for a better look-around, and sometimes even start licking food right off my teeth. It was a terrible habit to have let her fall into, and sometimes I'd nibble on her mouse chow to get her to take interest in it, but I made sure she got regular greens, various rolled whole grains, millet branches, small bits of protein (freeze-dried salmon cubes and mini-shrimps), and banana (both fresh and freeze-dried), as well as lots of vitamin-enriched multi-grain baby food porridge that she would ALWAYS eat. If I'd had a food processor, maybe I would have tried pulverizing the mouse chow and stirring it into the porridge so she'd eat the whole nutritional spectrum it contained. Somehow little April made it to around her two-year birthday, even with her occasional theft of an entire cheese cracker, and the time she went snout-first into the side of a brownie cake.

If you start your mousies on Reggie & Mimi, and don't let them watch you when you eat your "giant mouse" food, then they may do better about eating the variety you provide them with. Also, in a community of mousies, they will be more likely, I would think, to do what each other does, and less likely to do what you do.

Let us know how it goes!

by Peachy Wed 11 Dec 2019, 9:16 am

A good quality small bird seed could be an option, too. This is what I’ve fed my mice for years because small animal food frequently has too much crude protein, sunflower seeds or corn. With supplements like scrambled eggs, quality dog kibble, fruits and veggies, oats, etc bird seed can make a great diet!

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