Facts About Mice That Will Blow Your Mind
While Cinderella befriended the mice in her house, these rodents are the last thing you want to see scurrying around your home. Mice like living in crawl spaces and walls, gnawing on wood, and even your items.
The rodents are also notorious for carrying bacteria and germs that they can spread to humans. Mice have several known species, with house mice being the most common. During colder months, house mice often find their way inside homes searching for shelter and food.
Mice are also the number one pest in most homes that people have to deal with and require immediate pest control in Dublin. These small but terrible rodents originated in Central Asia and can now be found in almost all countries around the world. Despite their size, these rodents are known to be very intelligent, aside from being a serious nuisance.
Here are other interesting facts about mice that will blow your mind and change how you look at these pests:
Mice are Considered Clean
People often assume that mice only show up in dirty environments because mice themselves are also dirty. However, would you believe that this is not the case at all?
Just so you know, mice groom themselves several times a day, just like their ultimate arch-nemesis, the cat. Mice also like to separate their burrows into several areas where they sleep and eat.
What does it mean, then? It means that your house doesn’t only attract mice if it is dirty. Mice can find small unsealed crevices as an opportunity for them to get inside the house and settle down.
Mice are Smart Rodents
One of the most mind-blowing facts about mice is that despite being small, these rodents are very smart creatures. These rodents have an excellent memory, with the ability to remember their family members as well as the trails and routes around their homes.
Pet mice can also recall their names and recognize every time they are called. Thanks to this intelligence, mice can get incredibly crafty and avoid getting caught.
Researchers also discovered that mice have various expressions. They were able to identify several familiar human emotions with the help of machine vision such as pleasure, pain, nausea, and disgust.
Mice are Extremely Flexible
Mice have long been known for their ability to fit even into the smallest spaces. They can easily squeeze through cracks or holes that measure ¼ inch.
Their ribs allow them to fit into these small areas. Mice have collapsible rib cages, which means their ribs can contort and bend, allowing them to push through spaces you wouldn’t even imagine.
The head is the biggest part of a mouse, which is how the rodent determines if it can fit in a certain area. If the head can go through, so will its entire body.
Mice are Omnivores
Another of the facts about mice is that they are extremely opportunistic rodents: they eat almost anything they find. Their diet is mostly made up of grains and seeds, although they also love to eat vegetables, fruits, and even your pet’s food!
These rodents also love to eat foods with high fat and protein content. Interestingly, cheese isn’t the first food that mice go for. Some even claim that mice find chocolate more attractive than cheese.
Mice are Acrobats
Another of the facts about mice is that they are incredible acrobats and gymnasts. They are insanely adept at climbing, running, jumping, and even swimming. They also wouldn’t have a hard time jumping a massive foot into the air. Thanks to their ability to run and climb, they can easily make their way to high areas like pantries. This is why it is important to seal all food in hard plastic containers if you are dealing with a rodent issue at home.
Mice Can Spread Different Diseases
While mice themselves love to practice grooming, it still doesn’t mean that they cannot catch and spread diseases themselves. These rodents can spread diseases through their urine and droppings. Thus, it is critical to deal with a mouse problem in your home before it turns into a serious infestation.
Mice and Humans Evolved Together
Commensal animals are animals that live near humans and rely on them for survival without offering something in return. Mice have long infested human homes ever since mankind started building them.
These rodents choose to live in areas where humans also live such as houses, apartments, farms, barns, and others. They are also believed to have evolved side by side with humans when they began to construct permanent dwellings.
The connection between mice and humans goes back to the beginning of time, with mice relying heavily on human homes and buildings to form their nests.
Mice Have Excellent Senses
While mice might not have the best eyesight, they easily make up for this shortcoming through their incredible sense of hearing, smell, and taste.
Just so you know, mice are colour-blind, focusing only on items that are about a foot away from them. However, these rodents can easily detect motion even from a distance of 45 feet! Mice can hear frequencies ranging from 1,000 to 91,000 Hertz.
The hearing of mice is way superior compared to that of humans. The rodents also use sound for communication, relying on frequencies that humans can’t hear at all.
Mice Have Fast Reproduction
Another of the facts about mice is that they are known to have a fast reproduction, which explains why infestations are quite common. Even a single mouse in your house when left untreated for a long time can soon fill your home with mice.
A mouse reaches sexual maturity in just a few weeks after birth. A female mouse’s gestation period only takes 20 days or so. A single female mouse can produce 4 to 6 babies and can start to mate immediately after giving birth.
Considering the speed of their reproduction, it means that one female mouse can give birth to a staggering 30 to 60 babies in just a year.
Mice Teeth Grow Continuously
Rounding up the list of facts about mice that will blow your mind is that their teeth continue to grow, and as a result, they also constantly chew and gnaw throughout their lives. Mice are monophyodont, which means that their teeth when they were born will stay with them during their lifetime. They don’t get a new set or lose teeth, unlike humans.
Since their incisors constantly grow, they need to look for things to chew on that will wear them down and achieve the suitable length, or else, these will overgrow. Mice even sharpen their teeth by grinding for self-defence.
Be sure to call pest control Dublin experts right away if your mouse problems have gotten serious.
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