Mouse ate other mouse

by Halloweenladies13 Thu 20 Aug 2020, 2:57 am

I had four females. They always have food and water. Two were rescued, a mom and daughter. And two were babies from a breeder. A couple days ago I found the mom snacked on by her cage mates. I never witnessed aggression between any of them. It was shocking and disturbing. I check on them daily and if I hadn’t it probably would have been worse. It makes me feel sick and I’m having a hard time not projecting human emotions on them. They live in a little bigger than a 40 gallon diy mesh old “bunny” cage. Please help.

by Peachy Thu 20 Aug 2020, 8:38 pm

So sorry you witnessed that! I’ve experienced it a few times and it’s come up on the forum more frequently in the past few months. I’d say this isn’t an uncommon occurrence.

It’s highly unlikely that this was any awful crime or a result of unmet needs, but more likely that your mouse passed peacefully of some natural cause, and the others decided to clean up because that’s what they know to do. It’s an instinctive behavior intended to prevent gross things like disease and predators, because mice live in the moment and they don’t understand that you’ll be there to take her body away.

Of course that doesn’t make it less unsettling to find, but hopefully it helps a little bit to understand that she most likely passed peacefully. Good vibes

by Halloweenladies13 Fri 21 Aug 2020, 5:52 pm

Okay thank you so much for the response. The breeder said the same thing so I feel a little bit better that it wasn’t my fault. I’ve heard it happen to other people but I didn’t realize it could happen if no husbandry mistakes were made.

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Mouse ate other mouse

Mouse ate other mouse

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