# African Pygmy Mouse (Mus minutoides) pictures



## Jack Garcia

This is a specimen of Mus minutoides, the smallest mouse, the smallest rodent, and probably the smallest mammal on earth. It's also one of the smallest vertebrates. Newborn babies are the size of large ants.

I may or may not have a small colony of them. Their cage is so full of stuff to hide in/under I never see them and I don't want to disturb them in case they have babies, so it's a "hands-off" approach. This adult female was raised by housemice (Mus musculus) and is tractable, but only to a point. The red marker is for size comparison.

The pictures are of varying quality because she's hard to take pictures of!

Enjoy!


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## WillowDragon

So very tiny!! Great pics Jack!

Willow xx


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## Jack Garcia

Thanks! 

I love these little mice. They're so tiny it's almost unbelievable, especially since I'm used to giant show PEWs. :lol:

These mice are the size of one of the show PEW's ears!


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## Maplewood Stud

hey jack,

have just seen this thread 

im pickin up 2 pairs of these cuties on saturday, and i was just wondering what kind of set up u have for them and what u feed them etc..

thanks my dear

x x

_edited for spelling _


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## Jack Garcia

I have mine in two 10 gallon tanks with sani chips as bedding and lots of climbing space. They eat the same stuff as regular mice but they need more protein and if they don't have fresh water they can die within a day, so keep that in mind. They also need a constant source of heat since they're desert animals. If you kept them in an unheated shed they'd get sickly and possibly die.


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## WillowDragon

I heard that they can't drink out out watrer bottles because they aren't strong enough, is that right Jack?

Willow xx


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## Jack Garcia

Yes and no.

Some water bottles they definitely wouldn't be able to drink from. I found some small ones and hung them so that they're barely an inch off the ground, and they're able to get water from them. Depending on how heavy the water bottle is and how heavy the ball bearing is, they may not be able to operate it.

What I did when I first got mine is to leave slices of apple and cucumber laying around at all times so they could get water that way if they needed it, and only after I saw them successfully using the water bottle did I take the fruit away.


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## moustress

Very cool! They look like itsy bitsy deer mousies, which are also very cool.


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