# Sudden unexplained death



## pro-petz (Nov 14, 2012)

History: Bought 10 Does from a pet shop on 20/10/12, not the best of pet shops been trading now for about 19 years the first 10 years had many complaints about the welfare of the animals which has improved of late. All the Does I purchased I did feel may have been alittle on the young stage to be weaned but all were feeding and drinking.

Did usual morning feed and health check of all animals and none seemed to show any signs of ill health time 08:30am last weight of animal was 27g as of 23/12/12. General mousery maintenance observations done at 13:00 and all still appeared healthy and active. Evening check 20:15 found this Doe dead at the front of the cage.

Husbandry: No change in diet, bedding or any other environmental things within the mousery as always maintained at mid 70`s F and humidity of about 50%.

Heath check at 08:30 23/12/12 no rspiratory wheezing using stethoscope heart rate within parameters temperature within paramaters every test done showed nothing out of the normal parameters for a mouse of approx 3 months of age.

Any sugesstions what the cause may be?

I have placed the entire colony into quarantine for the well being of all the other mice in the mousery and so that I can monitor the colony on the quarantine schedule of hourly rather than four times a day as per mousery.


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## madmouse (May 19, 2012)

I'm so sorry for your loss. Nearly anything could have happened to the deceased mouse. Strokes and heart attacks can certainly happen in young creatures. She could have had an internal defect from birth. She could have choked on a piece of food. Possibly injured her head or spine while romping with her sisters? Had a unique sensitivity/allergy to some substance in the environment? It's definitely smart of you to quarantine her cagemates, but I haven't personally seen any contagious illness that kills without symptoms. Then again, I certainly haven't seen every infectious disease out there. I've had a few mysterious deaths like this over the years myself.


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## pro-petz (Nov 14, 2012)

Thanks madmouse, I have a very strict animal husbandry policy just in case someone else has to look after my animals whilst away for any reason so was set up so my other half has plain and simple instructions to follow for as many things as I can think of.

I just hope what ever it was is not an airborne thing as that would be very bad, have to wait on path lab results I guess after the holiday season.


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