Cage bedding or substrate types an enormous a part of the house atmosphere for pet mice. So, it’s actually essential that the bedding varieties we select are secure, comfy, and let our rodents specific their pure behaviors.
The content material of this text was contributed by visitor creator (and rodent wrangler extraordinaire) Beri Instone.
Sorts of Bedding That Pet Mice Want
There are three forms of bedding that pet mice want:
- Substrate
- Litter
- Nesting materials
Let’s go over each.
Substrate
That is the primary bedding that fills the bottom of the cage. It has two main functions:
- it traces the cage and
- absorbs urine (rats and mice are inclined to pee the place they need) which protects each the animals and the cage.
It’s essential to differentiate between absorbency and drainage:
- Absorbent beddings will mop up wee, maintain it so the liquid isn’t involved with the animals, and damp down the scent.
- Beddings with good drainage, like many rooster bedding merchandise, let the wee run to the underside of the cage, however don’t really soak it up, leaving the urine to pool and trigger issues.
The opposite essential use for substrate is to offer the animals with the alternative to dig, and construct tunnels and nests. This can be a essential pure habits for mice that must be supplied within the cage.
Rats housed in flat-based cages will be saved entertained with massive digging containers of free substrate throughout the cage. Nevertheless, mice really want a deep primarily based cage with a thick layer of substrate, each as a result of they don’t develop into litter educated in the best way rats do, and since digging and nesting is a very basic habits.
Litter
An unscented 100% paper cat litter positioned within the cage corners the place the rodents prefer to pee and poo is essential for absorbing urine and feces. For pet rats, offering paper litter pellets in a flat or nook litter tray additionally encourages litter coaching and good toileting habits. Mice are a lot more durable to litter prepare, however they do have the intuition to rest room in a single place. One of the best guess is to work out which space of the cage they’re utilizing and put a superb handful of cat litter underneath the substrate to enhance absorbency.
It’s essential to solely use paper cat litter for rodents, as wooden and mineral pellets break down into mud when moist and a few could also be unsafe if ingested (and rodents will eat their litter!)
Nesting
That is materials for the animals to make use of in constructing nests and lining their sleeping areas. Mice particularly are very eager on constructing advanced 3D nests so it’s important to offer them a combination of bedding varieties, together with these with an extended strand size, to work with.
Paper is the preferred possibility. This may be tissue (paper towel or bathroom roll) or ripped up newspaper. Rats aren’t fussy about how their newspaper is introduced (I have a tendency to only give them the entire sheet and so they do the remainder). Nevertheless, mice, being smaller and wanting to construct nests, want newspaper to be ripped up into lengthy skinny strips.
One other good possibility for nesting, particularly for mice, are pure bedding varieties like hay or good high quality straw (low-cost cow-grade straw is just too pointy). Hay particularly additionally provides different forms of engagement to the cage. Rodents are attracted by its scent and might nibble on it, making it of extra curiosity to work together with.
Substrate Bedding Choices for Mice
Substrate is the kind of bedding the place homeowners are confronted with the most important selection and conflicting recommendation so let’s take a look on the choices.
Cardboard Bedding
This comes as shredded cardboard strips or cardboard squares. It’s a bedding kind initially developed for horses, however now additionally bought for small animals in lots of international locations.
Cardboard bedding is standard as the great dimension items permit the rodents to each dig and manipulate it. There are few disadvantages, particularly whether it is used with one other bedding from the record for complementary traits. Nevertheless, its finest to purchase a superb high quality bedding, as some thinner varieties lack absorbency and can develop into soggy fairly rapidly.
Paper Bedding
Choices for paper bedding have expanded in lots of international locations lately with the event of function made substrates which might be softer than paper cat litter, however extra absorbent than shredded paper (I exploit cross-cut shredded paper rather a lot to bulk out costlier industrial bedding, however by itself it flattens out and will get pungent fairly rapidly).
Paper bedding is nice for rodents and homeowners who’ve allergy symptoms to pure merchandise, and lots of manufacturers have related benefits to cardboard bedding. Nevertheless, it’s essential to examine your native manufacturers out for your self as some are scented (which may trigger respiratory irritation), and a few will be fairly dusty.
Hemp Bedding
This has develop into standard not too long ago, as an all-natural different to wood-shavings. There are a number of manufacturers relying on the place you reside – I discover my domestically out there one a bit positive, and I have a tendency to combine it with one thing coarser.
This can be a notably essential concern in case you are shopping for bedding for mice or different rodents who dig tunnels, because the positive shreds collapse inwards. Nevertheless, it’s a good absorbent bedding, so ideally suited to combine in with one thing with much less absorbency however extra construction, like cardboard. Utilizing hemp the place mice want to rest room can assist preserve litter prices down.
One factor to be careful for with hemp is that some manufacturers add scents to it, which is unhealthy for rodent respiratory methods. So, when shopping for, be certain to select an unscented possibility.
Coconut Husk Bedding (Coir)
This can be a product designed for reptiles, however which has gained recognition amongst small animal homeowners as one other pure different to wood-shavings. I’m presently utilizing a mid-sized model combined with hemp, shredded paper, or kiln-dried shavings (see under) in my digging containers. Some manufacturers comprise a variety of fibers, so it’s price trying carefully at what you’re shopping for and checking that they’re appropriate for mice.
The draw back to coir is that it isn’t very absorbent (reptiles don’t pee rather a lot), so alone it isn’t a superb bedding for temperate-adapted rodents like mice or rats. Nevertheless, it’s one thing that may be added right into a combined substrate for selection.
Wooden Shavings
Are wooden shavings a secure kind of bedding for mice? Nicely, it relies on the kind of shaving you’re asking about.
Historically, shavings bought for rodents have been the most affordable high quality potential – by-products of different wooden industries. They have been principally made from pine or (particularly within the US) cedar, had a excessive phenol content material, and have been very dusty. That made them unhealthy for the delicate respiratory methods of small rodents. Exhausting woods reminiscent of aspen, that are standard within the US, don’t comprise the identical ranges of phenols, however low-quality merchandise can nonetheless be dusty.
Nevertheless, not all wooden shavings are created equal.
Particularly, wooden shaving beddings designed for horses at the moment are turning into broadly out there. The factor about horses is that they’re as delicate to their bedding as rodents, however they’re additionally immensely helpful – which suggests the equestrian world invested to find secure choices. It was found that if wooden shavings (together with pine) are warmth handled, the oily phenol content material which may in any other case trigger metabolic points is diminished to negligible ranges. In the meantime, mud extraction strategies allow a product that has a low mud content material and is unlikely to trigger respiratory irritation.
So, wooden shavings can type a secure bedding for rodents so long as we purchase ones which were warmth handled (e.g. kiln dried) and mud extracted.
The drawback of bedding designed for horses is it tends to come back by the trailer load – which is barely greater than the common mouse proprietor wants! Nevertheless, it’s price purchasing round – my native impartial pet store has not too long ago began stocking kiln-dried shavings in 20 L baggage. I’ve purchased just a few, and thus far they’re a success with the Horde.
Keep away from:
- low-cost bedding made from uncooked softwoods (these will typically be the manufacturers marketed for small animals),
- noticed mud (too positive),
- wooden chips (not absorbent sufficient),
You’re searching for tender, good-sized flakes.
Fleece and Newspaper
Mice ought to at all times be saved on a thick layer of a number of of the free beddings listed above. They want the absorbency and digging alternatives a well-chosen free bedding gives.
Nevertheless, many mice and rats (together with my pack known as the Horde) are saved in massive cages with flat bases, which aren’t appropriate for full substrate protection. Homeowners with these cages have two decisions:
- construct or purchase a deep cage base to place substrate in (which is what I’m doing in certainly one of my cage sections),
- or use a flat substrate to cowl the cage base, and supply massive digging containers of free substrate for engagement.
The 2 supplies popularly used to cowl flat cage bases are fleece material and newspaper.
Fleece has gained a variety of recognition not too long ago as a result of it’s washable and reusable, and many house owners like the looks. Personally, I’m not a fan. The neat look isn’t, for me, what mice and rats are about – I like them to have the flexibleness to vary their atmosphere, which incorporates digging and ripping up their flooring protecting. Fleece additionally has very poor absorbency, so it smells rapidly and until it’s used with one thing absorbent beneath (pet pads, vetbed, or a superb layer of litter), and altered very steadily, it might result in ammonia burns or pores and skin issues in rodents.
Newspaper additionally has absorbency points, but it surely does have the benefit that mice and rats can rip it up into bits and do what they need with it. I exploit newspaper to line the flat elements of my cage the place the rats are energetic, however not sleeping or weeing. In areas the place they are going to be weeing, digging or sitting round, I put containers and baskets with litter or free substrate.
So, What’s the Finest Bedding for Mice?
One of the best bedding in your mice will rely on the manufacturers which might be out there the place you reside, however the rules for selecting it are common:
- All mice want entry to ample free substrate for digging, and this could cowl the cage base in a thick layer.
- Any substrate must be absorbent (and never simply free-draining), with litter added in areas used for toileting.
- Beddings ought to be low in mud, freed from synthetic scent, and if wood-shavings are getting used, they need to be warmth handled to take away phenols.
Usually the very best outcomes will be discovered by mixing bedding varieties, to maximise the absorbency, digging choices and engagement for the rodents.
