Pet ratties ate a wild mouse...

Boyfriend found my cat Luna with a dead mouse this morning (yay Luna, keeping the apartment clean!), and she didn’t eat it, so she’s safe. However, I came home from an early morning meeting to not only that dead mouse, but ANOTHER dead mouse IN THE RAT CAGE. HALF-EATEN. Rosalie was crouching by it, hoarding it in the hidey house. I assume both rats partook in the feast, and am a little worried... I will watch their feces for any parasites or other warning signs, but was wondering if anyone on here has had past experiences with this? Thanks.

Wow, suicidal mice at your place. No experience with it, so I can't help you there. I'm sure most regular mice are healthy. Perhaps a dose of Revolution might be prudent?

This is extremely dangerous !!!

They must be either babies who don't know better or mice who are desperate for food and water
Mice, like all animals, will fight for their lives so your rats could get seriously uninjured or killed
You need to make sure that mice can not get into your rats cage.

Please put down food and water for the mice somewhere far from the rats
then try to humanely trap them and rehome them outside if they are wild mice (unless you catch a nursing mama who will need to be released to get back to her litter or you catch a baby as it would be unable to survive on it's own)
Mice live in family groups so they will need to all go outside to the same place
You will need to find where they are coming in and fix the problem etc

This may help http://mouseranch.com/

EDIT: then again, they may be pet mice in need of being rescued

Thanks SQ - unfortunately we can't do any of our own trapping in our apartment, as that is controlled by Community Housing. They are coming in on Monday to set out traps for us, and to try to fix the problems. We have an idea of where they may be coming from and some solutions for it, so hopefully that helps. It is odd, though, as they've never had an issue like this before, especially on the third floor...

Rosalie is a pretty vicious rat when it comes to predators and prey. She easily got this mouse, and she has definitely lunged at our cat to defend her territory before. They should be fine for now, hopefully... I am mostly worried over the ingestion of the animal. I don't even know HOW the mouse got in the cage in the first place!

We know for sure that there is one more little guy somewhere around, as our cat was hunting it before it got away. Either she will take care of it, or the traps will. Unfortunately, I can't guarantee the humanity of them, as we have no control over that... But anyway. Here's to hoping the rats stay safe - that's my main priority!

Actually you do have some control if they are going to be placed in your apartment.
You can request humane traps and if they put down inhumane traps in your apartment you can remove them and put down humane traps instead.
I hope you can find the remaining little mouse and save his life

Is it possible that they are escaped or abandoned pets?

I know of rats that were killed when they cornered starving mice in their cage .... the mice were desperate for food and water
as your mice must be or they would not risk it
I hope that you put out food and water for them in a safe area ... poor mice

SQ said:

Actually you do have some control if they are going to be placed in your apartment.
You can request humane traps and if they put down inhumane traps in your apartment you can remove them and put down humane traps instead.
I hope you can find the remaining little mouse and save his life

Is it possible that they are escaped or abandoned pets?

I know of rats that were killed when they cornered starving mice in their cage .... the mice were desperate for food and water
as your mice must be or they would not risk it
I hope that you put out food and water for them in a safe area ... poor mice

Click to expand...

We no longer have an issue, yay! Luna caught the third mouse and we grabbed it in some kleenex while she stalked it. Took it outside and released it. I don't think there are any more.

They were definitely not pets - just your average field mice. We would have been informed of loose pets, especially mice, via email or when I called in if that was the case. The Housing group keeps records of pets for allergy purposes.

Unless you released it a fair distance from your building chances are it will find its way back in.