Make sure your mice have a healthy diet

Facts 

• Mice can die if they are deprived of water for even short periods of time.

• Mice are opportunistic omnivores and will eat both plant and animal based food. Wild mice will eat a wide variety of seeds, grains, and other plant material as well as invertebrates, small vertebrates and carrion. 

• Wild mice find food by foraging and spend a large proportion of their waking activity time visiting familiar feed sites within their territory.

• Mice are coprohagic rodents, this means that they eat their faeces to enable them to absorb essential nutrients such as vitamin B12 and folic acid. They eat cecal faeces from the floor of their cage.

• It is essential that mice are provided with Magnesium, Vitamin A, and Choline in their diet.

• It is essential that Folic acid is present in the diet of growing and reproducing mice.

• Grapes/raisins, rhubarb and walnuts are poisonous to mice, and lettuce can cause them to have diarrhoea.

Things you should do 

• Make sure your mice have access to clean drinking water.

• Provide water in bottles with metal sipper tubes, and check them daily for leaks and/or blockages.

• Change their water regularly and clean the bottle and nozzle properly to avoid contamination.

• Feed your mice a good quality balanced diet to prevent nutritional related problems.

• Supplement their diet with small amounts of suitable fresh fruit and vegetables, on occasion, as part of their daily allowance and not in addition.

• Scatter portions of their daily food allowance around the cage to encourage foraging behaviour.

• Mice must be allowed to engage in coprophagic behaviour.