Mice...germs?

[dawn515]

I hope this isn't a hopelessly stupid question. Everyone says rodents carry disease -- but, other than the bubonic plague -- what disease?

 

I live in an urban neighborhood and we have rats outside. Big ones. I ignore them because they're not in my house.

 

Last night I came home from school, and I kept hearing my cat messing around with my recycling bin in the kitchen. He'd never done that before, so I kept shooing him, and finally resorted to incarcerating him in the bedroom for bad behavior while I wrote an essay for school.

 

However, as I wrote the essay, I heard noise from the recycling bin. I walked in there and LOOKED at it to make sure. Saw nothing. But, then I heard something. A stirring. It hadn't been the cat messing around with it -- something was in there.

 

I promptly let the cat out of the bedroom because a) he obviously had not been the cause of the noises and b) he could help me watch over the recycling bin, which, yes, he was fascinated by. His fascination solidified that there was, indeed, a living presense in there.

 

I'm a jumpy person. I didn't want to take apart the recycling can by can to discover what living thing was in there. So, I did the cowardly thing, and waited for my boyfriend to get home to take care of it. I didn't want anything popping out at me like a jack in the box. I mean, everyone hates jack-in-the-boxes, unless they're serving hamburgers.

 

Well, that didn't work. My sister called me, and, as I talked with her, I forgot about the recycling, the presense, and my cat. Then, I just remember talking to my sister for awhile, looking down at my cat, and then screaming, "OH MY GOD IT'S A MOUSE!" as he dropped a very alive furry thing on the carpet in front of me.

 

The cat promptly swept it back up in his jaws and ran away. I ran after him. I cornered him by the front door, quite defiant, with his prize in his jaws, the grey tail hanging out of his mouth. I immediately went to get the prize out of his mouth on instinct -- not sure if it was the instinct that makes me soft on animals or the instinct that doesn't want to clean up the entrails cats like to leave around. But I grabbed that sucker with my cell phone still in hand.

 

Then, wow, I realized I had a mouse in my hand. "What do I do?" I lamented to my sister, who had asked "Are you okay?" at my first scream.

 

"What are you doing?" she asked.

 

"Holding the mouse in my hand," I said.

 

"It has germs!" she said.

 

I knew that. Yeah, mouse=germs, right? She told me to throw it out the window. I live on the second floor; it was a baby mouse; that seemed cruel.

 

I told her I'd call her back and hung up to contemplate the tiny mouse in my hand. I opened my palm a little to see if it was okay from the Kitty Death Grip. Looked okay, no blood, seemed a bit traumatized. It was so tiny, so cute, I had to pet it with my finger. Then I thought -- oh, germs!

 

I held it against my body (with sweater) in a cupped hand to open the door and go down the stairs to the garden. When I went outside, it seemed to sense that it was outside and started struggling. I pried its teeny paws off of me and let it go into the grass.

 

I promptly went upstairs and washed my hands with anti-bacterial soap.

 

I haven't seen any sign of mouse droppings in my apt, so this seems to be isolated. But my friends seem a bit concerned that I handled the mouse itself. Should I worry about that? Do mice indeed carry "germs" I should worry about? I thought it was more mouse droppings that cause a problem, not the mice themselves.

 

Thanks for any advice!

[Scotcha]

Mice do indeed carry "germs". Everything does including yourself, your cat, and even your sister.

 

You didn't get bitten or scratched. You washed your hands.. I'd say you're good to go.

[BellaDonna]

I think you'll be okay since you washed your hands right away. As Scotcha mentioned, you did not get scratched or bitten by the mouse so your skin was not punctured. You didn't touch droppings.

 

I'm glad you did not throw the poor little guy out the window.- I would have handled it the same way.

 

I held abandoned baby skunks before and I never got sick.

 

If your cat goes outdoors where the mice are- then the cat probably has the same level of germs anyways. In fact, I think you're more likely to get sick from a cat scratching you, than you are from holding a mouse.

 

BellaDonna

[robowarrior]

I think you reacted in a strange way. When a cat acts like that don't you think ' its doing that for a reason?' you went against that cat instead of investigating the problem. Im personally also against killing, rodents are considered as a pest, and if you leave that baby mouse to live there will only be more mice.

 

You definitly need to call your local government and complain about the rat infestation. If you don't complain or call an exterminator problems will only become worse. Simular to the rats, first you neglect them, but in reality your only giving time to make the problem grow even bigger, as the reproduce its only a matter of time before more rats and mice will show up. Immediate intervention is needed. Seal up all holes,you need strong materials, mixed with glass so they won't be eager to bite themselves thru the walls.

 

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Be sure that your cat isn't able to accidently eat the poison. There might be also environmental friendly solutions. Like a cat =^_^= , but it would be better to advice everyone in the neighbourhood to get a cat then, so that they will naturally hunt all those rats and mice out of the neighbourhood.

[Locke2121]

You have a cat that scratches its own poop, and your worried about germs from a mouse???

 

Don't worry, your gonna be ok. I would have kept the little bugger as a pet, but at least you didn't kill it.

[dawn515]

Well, it did scratch me -- it did struggle a bit when I was trying to let it go, but it didn't break the skin (as in, no blood). That's why I was asking.

 

Bella, I am so soft-hearted, I made sure to take the mouse out to the back garden because the building manager has put out rat traps in the building. It really was a cute, tiny baby mouse, and I have seen the huge rats outside my window. I don't really wish the the rats any harm either. I know why they are there -- because of the illegal dump next door. I have nothing personal against rodents and, really, I could never, ever kill one. I have thought of springing the rat traps myself.

 

But, even if that tiny mouse scratched me, which it did, I have nothing to worry about, I hope. I do know it's mainly droppings that are a problem.

 

My kitty is indoor only -- I live in an urban area and can't let him outside.

[dawn515]

Don't worry, your gonna be ok. I would have kept the little bugger as a pet, but at least you didn't kill it.

 

LOL, I thought about that, but I had nothing to keep it in. Putting it in a jar would have been cruel! Besides, it probably would have died within three days because of captivity.

 

Really. The thing was freaking adorable, and yeah, I petted it even though it was a mouse.

 

I should tell you guys my other mouse story -- hehe, not a good one.

[dawn515]

I think you reacted in a strange way.

 

How so? :splat:

[Locke2121]

LOL, I thought about that, but I had nothing to keep it in. Putting it in a jar would have been cruel! Besides, it probably would have died within three days because of captivity.

 

Really. The thing was freaking adorable, and yeah, I petted it even though it was a mouse.

 

I should tell you guys my other mouse story -- hehe, not a good one.

 

Hmmm....maybe you should keep and eye open for an aquarium at yard sales for just such an emergency! What other tale?

[dawn515]

Hmmm....maybe you should keep and eye open for an aquarium at yard sales for just such an emergency! What other tale?

 

Wellllll, mice aren't hamsters, so I don't think I could keep it in good conscience. The thing was cute, for sure, and I joked to my friends that it was thinking, "Well, that's It," when my cat snatched it up in its jaws. I suppose I served as the deus ex machina when I rescued it, held it, petted it (yep), and then let it go in the garden. Hey, I'm not a meanie or something!

[dawn515]

You have a cat that scratches its own poop, and your worried about germs from a mouse???

 

I know you meant this comment harmlessly, but I thought I might add that toxoplasmosis is a real threat to others -- those with immune problems (AIDS), pregnant women, etc.

 

Be careful of the cat poop!

[BellaDonna]

Yeah. I was actually thinking that when I read your post. If you are pregnant and have a cat- it's best to scoop the litterbox with a mask and gloves on or just have someone else do it during the pregnancy.

 

In most cases though, if your doctor knows that you own a cat- they will screen your blood for the antibody. In my case, since I owned cats all of my life, I was all set, however my husband still scoops out the litterbox just to be on the safe side. Moms-to-be need not get rid of their cats out of fear:

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As for the rodents, if you are interested in humane traps for your apartment- that is an option. I catch mice in my garage with them all the time, and I let them go in the woods, a good distance away so that they do not come back.

 

BellaDonna

[dawn515]

Hmmm....maybe you should keep and eye open for an aquarium at yard sales for just such an emergency! What other tale?

 

Oh yeah! THAT tale. Forgot I mentioned it. STOP reading if you're queasy.

 

My only other mouse tale (this one not cute):

 

I had noticed droppings around my apartment and suspected I had a mouse. (This was in my last apartment.) Yet, I had never seen it, and I had a cat. I went out of town overseas for about ten days, but had a friend house sit. Unfortunately, my cat at the time was the very, very shy type, and since I wasn't home and a stranger was there to take care of him, he hid in the closet the entire time.

 

Welll.... I got back, reunited with the shy cat and it was all love, everywhere. Then I went to go clean the dishes in the sink. I noticed something like...seeds around the sink. Then I noticed they got thicker around the cookie sheet I had washed and put behind the sink before I left. I instantly knew what the "seeds" were (dried maggots) but didn't know why they were there, so I very, very timidly pulled back the cookie sheet leaning against the wall behind my sink.

 

I found a mouse sticking to the cookie sheet in the first stages of decay, and it had maggots all over him, but for whatever reason, they had dried up. I instantly threw the cookie sheet away, put on some gloves, and tried peeling the mouse off the wall between it and my sink. It peeled away, except for its head. Its head just... fell off.

 

It took A LOT to not throw up at this point. I mean, I dealt with the dead maggots, the dead mouse, the awful, awful smell, etc. But its dead head pulling away from the rest of the body???? ACK!

 

Well, I didn't have a boyfriend then (LOL), so I had no one to call to do it for me, so cleaned up the rest of the corpse, including pulling away the mouse's sticky, rotting head from the wall, and took it down to the dumpster.

 

That's the worst mouse story I have.

 

So, there ya go, Locke! LOL.

 

At least this last time I saved some baby mouse from a nasty death at the jaws of my cat and set him free, eh? Much better than the dried maggots!

[Locke2121]

Ewww...didn't your friend notice a smell or anything?