Hello fellow mousekeepers!

As we all know, finding vets who will see mice as patients can be quite the challenge, and not all of the ones who will are worth going to. So I’ve decided that I want to create a resource document people can check for vets who are recommended for or recommended against. I plan to have the general setup of the document set up this week so that I can just continue adding to it and updating as I get more info. I hope this will in time become as thorough as the childfree sub’s doctor list.

I started my list with vets local to me, but of course not everyone lives or can travel to my area. And although I’d like to move elsewhere someday, the thought that I won’t be able to secure equally good healthcare for my little goobers is terrifying. If I feel that way, I’m sure others do as well. Not to mention that a lot of people new to having mice don’t realize that mice require exotic vets, and get blindsided by “small animal vets” meaning “dogs & cats.”

So! If you know of a vet who sees mice as patients, I would like as much of the following information as you can provide:

- The vet’s full name
- The name of the clinic they are typically at
- The city, state/province/region, and country they’re in
- Cost of a standard appointment, not including medications or surgery, or cost of neutering surgery (if applicable)
- Whether the vet does only wellness checks, or wellness + diagnostics and treatments
- Whether the vet does neutering surgery, general health need surgeries, or both
- Whether the vet sees only fancy mice, or also ASFs and other exotic pet trade mice
- Whether the vet sees deer mice or other native species
- Whether the vet is in-person at a clinic only, offers remote services, or in-home care
- Your recommendation level of the vet: travel to see them, dependable local, okay in a pinch, unknown (you just know of them), or warning mousekeepers against seeing them
- A quick review of your experience with them

Multiple reviews of the same vet are welcome. That just further corroborates the recommendation level.

You’re more than welcome to post the info in the comments here for anyone searching the sub for this sort of info if you’d like to give a shout out to an awesome vet.
If you’re uncomfortable posting location information on a public forum, I totally understand, and have set up a google form as a more streamlined way to collect the info.

The link to that is here:

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScORIEySYZfEY7KJ3JFiqOS6FK5lYD52_BbwoYw2XmD5eMzQg/viewform

If you don’t have a vet you want to shout out or just want to share your lovely mice, you can boost this post with a picture of your mice (drawings of all skill levels accepted if you don’t have your own mice to take photos of).
If you know someone with mice who isn’t a Reddit user, please feel free to pass the google form link along.

For mouse tax, please enjoy this old photo of when my ASFs had their first vet visit as babies to be sexed (Moringa staring intently, and Mukaya looking extra scrunkly), and this new photo of Moringa, all grown up and displeased about getting eyedrops.

Fun fact: all the stinky old mouse bedding doesn’t have to be useless trash!

At a previous living situation, I had a lazy diy bin for cold compost (cold compost = dump all the stuff in the bin and ignore it as nature takes its course). Composting is mostly a balance of nitrogen and carbon, but it doesn’t need to be some arduous mathematical task. I just put in soiled mouse bedding and kitchen scraps, which over time turned into marvelous soil. That’s the dirt my irises are happily growing in.
In gardens, ammonium nitrate is added as a fertilizer. Urine contains urea, which is a nitrogenous compound that breaks down into ammonia. Bacteria then convert the ammonia into nitrites, then nitrates, which combine with the rest of the ammonia to become ammonium nitrate. As a result, the compost dirt contains lots of fertilizer without my having to buy or add anything. Science!

In my current living situation, compost bins are outlawed but I have been granted permission to have a little veggie patch and a disability-friendly compost pile in the middle of it.
So with subsequent bedding changes, I repurposed the mouse bedding as self-fertilizing mulch for my chaos garden, with any extra added to the pile. There is now a thriving population of roly-polies and crickets munching it down so it doesn’t smell at all, and the soil beneath it doesn’t get dried out. And look how happy my kale plants are despite them all growing way too close together! Even my little bell pepper plant has taken off and already has a couple peppers starting to form. The vigorously bushy potato plant next to the kale is extra happy because it’s planted at the edge of the compost pile. Ignore the grass: I’m at war with the notoriously invasive weed called Bermuda grass, so I’m letting all the polite (easily pulled without cutting my hands) grasses stay for a bit because they’re taking up space the Bermuda wants to infiltrate. My end goal is to have a solid mix of food crops, dandelions, and clover growing in the garden with no grasses, and a border ring of irises.

Big charcoal/white butt is my ASF boy.
White with a few grey bits is my long-haired fancy girl, and the solid white is her sister.

We will probably be getting a lot of traffic owing to recent coverage of the Hantavirus cruise. I'm here to clear things up before people start spreading misinformation.

TL;DR:

You're not at threat. Hantavirus rare in rodents. Don't vacuum mouse poop. Wear gloves and wash up if at home. Wear respirator if cleaning rodent infested buildings. Scroll to bottom for CDC picture guide.

What is Hantavirus/HPS?

Hantaviruses are a family of viruses that are carried by certain rodents. They've been around for a long time, but have recently been a topic of news coverage owing to certain outbreaks/talks of Hantavirus pulmonary syndrome(HPS).

HPS is a respiratory disease(having to do with lungs/breathing) that results from coming into contact with infected rodents, most often via waste or saliva. It usually doesn't spread person-to-person, but certain hantaviruses such as the Andes virus(a type of hantavirus from South America) have resulted in previous outbreaks of such.

The now famous Hantavirus cruise is believed to have been caused by the Andes virus:

>Dr Charlotte Hammer, an assistant professor and infectious disease epidemiologist at Cambridge University, said: “In the current case we are most likely talking about Andes virus, which is a New World hantavirus." - The Times^(3)

If you live outside of South America, your chances of coming into contact with the Andes strain are practically zero. You won't be getting HPS from interacting with other people.

This doesn't mean you're safe from all hantaviruses though, as they are spread almost globally.

Avoiding Hantavirus/HPS

The good thing is, avoiding hantaviruses is surprisingly easy.

If you live in the UK or the US, your chances of encountering a rodent with hantavirus are incredibly low, and even then, contracting hantavirus disease from a mouse is even lower.

In the US, about 38.5 million people each year are impacted by rodent problems^(5). Compare that to the ~29 reported cases of hantavirus disease yearly^(6).

That's 1 in 1,327,586.

Most hantavirus cases occur in the rural or wilderness southwest, often resulting from cleaning old outdoor buildings like barns, cabins, or sheds, without proper safety equipment.

Hantaviruses can be spread if rodent waste is aerosolized(turned into small particles). This can happen from sweeping or vacuuming. Don't vacuum rodent waste. That goes for any animal waste really.

So unless you're going around vacuuming rodent infested buildings with no respirator on, you're not going to get hantavirus.

Why is Everyone so Afraid?

Look, we've already dealt with one pandemic, the thought of another is scary. But it's mostly just sensationalized media. With proper safety procedures, you won't be getting infected. Whenever you hear of something like this in the future, whether it's a new virus at home or a million miles away, always make sure to check sources and read. And don't be coerced into panic by the news, that's one of their tricks to keep you coming back.

At the bottom of this article, I've attached the CDC Hantavirus Prevention Guidelines(US), guidance from the UK Health Security Agency on Reducing the risk of human infection from pet rodents, and a summary of hantavirus also by the UK Health Security Agency.

Sources:

1. CDC Recommendations

• The CDC Recommends using "Snap traps," which kill rodents. However, unless you are immunocompromised, using a live trap is perfectly safe so long as you follow the proper sanitary protocols. Wear gloves and sanitize everything.

1. UK Rodent Pet Safety
2. What is hantavirus? How is it transmitted and what are the symptoms?
3. Article by The Times
4. Report Shows U.S. States, Counties Experiencing Highest Rodent Issues
5. US Hantavirus Reports