How To Clean Mice Cages

Hi, my name's Marie. I'm the deputy manager of the Small Animal Department at Wood Green Animal Shelters and I'm going to tell you how to care for mice. I'm going to tell you how to clean a mouse cage.

Mice should be cleaned at least once a week. Everyday, you should remove any soiled bedding or food and just replace this with fresh. But each week, the mice will need to come out of the accommodation and they need to be thoroughly cleaned down and freshly replaced in the accommodation.

First of all, make sure you remove the mice from the accommodation and put them into a secure pet carrier. It's a really good idea if you can place some of the bedding from the accommodation into the carrier so they'd feel safe and secure with their own scents and smells, and maybe one of their little homes to hide into and that way will help them feel calm and relaxed during the process. So, place them into another room and makes sure that they are on a secure surface where no one's going to knock them and they're not going to be able to escape.

You then need a dustpan and brush, some pet disinfectant and a paper bin bag or your recycling bag for you to place the bedding material in. This tank is one of the best styles of mice cages. It should always be a large container at least 2 to 3 feet in length.

Although they're small, they're very active so they're going to need lots of space and lots of enrichment. So when you clean them, first, we're going to need to take the toys out of the accommodation. Make sure that these are completely dismantled and you either spray these or put them in a sink and thoroughly clean them out with the pet disinfectant.

When you add these toys back in, place them into different positions and even take some of the old ones out and add the new ones. Keep it interesting and create new ideas so they've got things to forage around in too. Once you've removed all the toys, you then need to clean the actual accommodation itself.

As I mentioned, use a good quality pet disinfectant and spray the whole enclosure down. Leave this to soak for a few minutes and then wash it down with the glove. Make sure you do rinse off thoroughly.

Once that's done, dry it all down and then refresh the bedding. When choosing a mouse bedding, the best idea is to go for short shredded paper or Carefresh and this can then be placed on a nice thick layer in the accommodation. Place that in, lots of fresh new toys, you can use some of the old toys you've had in there but make sure they are clean and make sure you pop them into new areas, so it's something different and interesting for the mice.

Scatter fresh food in there and make sure you've got some fresh soft bedding for them to sleep in as well, and then we're about ready for the mice to go in. Lastly, your water bottle should be cleaned every week. Make sure you've got a water bottle cleaner, empty the water out and clean inside and the spout area as well.

This water will need changing everyday as well the bottle being cleaned once a week, so do make sure you are keeping up this, otherwise bacteria can build up. When you place the bottle on, make sure that you're not putting it too high or too low so the mice haven't got to overreach for this. So it's nice and secure on, scatter some dry food in there, and then we're ready for the mice to go back in.

Always make sure that your lid is secure when you put the mice back in and clean out the carrier that the mice had been into so that it's ready for when you next clean them out. And that's how to clean a mouse cage.