Wood mice 20 9 2011

Aah, poor little things. At least you took them 'home' to a nearby field

They were so tiny i did not have the heart to kill them and my husband would have run a mile if I had asked him to do it. I hope they survive, well maybe the smallest one will. Their life expectancy is only about 18 months in the wild.

oh what a shame, dear little things, i think they may be wood mice??
harvest mice are incredibly tiny ~ i saw them once in a display at slimbridge ~ couldnt believe how little they were. 5 - 8 cm long!!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/wildfacts/factfiles/266.shtml

I think you are right. These were very small.The one underneath was about 6.5cm and the one on top not more than 5cm. The description given on the internet certainly seems to fit the wood mouse.

i really dont know ~ im no expert ~ it was the colour and the ears that made me think, perhaps my cat would know better ~ she catches them!!

We would not have had the opportunity of seeing them if our pussy cats were still around. Unless we had given Avenger a row then we would have been given one as a present to say he was sorry. I looked them up after I saw your post and the description tallied better with wood mice than with harvest mice. These might just be young ones. Maybe someone else will know. Cute, yes, but near me, no thank you.

they are so sweet ~ guess what my cat brought back last night!!!

I hope it was not in the house.

There are times when I am glad we don't have a cat flap - this was one of them!
She showed it to me thru the glass door!

Thank goodness for that.

we had a conversation through the door!!!!!

LOL!

:-)

Arent they lovely, I had a nest in my compost once, How i didn't stake them on my fork i dont know, they were tiny, baldy, blind babies Awwww, anyway I covered them with the compost and left well alone for a few weeks, they were gone when i gently cleared the compost, i like to think they survived :)))

Me too.

I'm glad I didn't find them, they would be been fostered, till strong enough to fend for their little selves, I'm terrible at doing things like that, and OH eyes almost reach the sky, when I bring yet another orphan home...
Well done SG, :)) hope they do well, especially as it's getting cold at night now...they wouldn't have stood a chance, with our four cats...:(((

We get field mice in the shed regularly. They nest in my boots and stuff themselves on the bird food if I don't protect it. They are bigger than those wee things.

Hope they survived in the filed!

I think their mothers toss them out at 3 weeks Crissue so I think they were old enough to look after themselves. i admire people like you who can offer unconditional love to our little creatures but I have never liked touching animals. I was brought up with animals but my worst nightmare would be ending up in an old folks home and having therapets dumped in my lap so I can unwind and relax. It makes my hair stand on end. We see field mice running around in the garden now and again but they are much bigger, you are right Somhairle. They also have a more uniform dull brown coat. I thought they were harvest mice at first but apparently they are only found as far up as Yorkshire.

We've dug up little underground nests in the garden Sg, and quickly covered them up again...
Yesterday I was digging out the bottom of my Compost, and straight away your post came to mind, and I was looking so hard to make sure there was nothing there, also Hedgehogs get in the Compost heaps too...

These were on top of the compost.They had obviously been nibbling on the seeds of an overhanging sedum because there was seeds everywhere. I thought they were harvest mice at first because they had made no effort to dig themselves out which I think field mice would have done. They are half way down the barrel in soft friable compost which has been cooking for more than two years. I had just started using it a few days before. I assumed that they paid regular visits to the sedums and dropped at the first signs of danger. Unfortunately they dropped further than they expected to. We rarely see hedgehogs in the garden and i have never come across mouse nests in the compost bins although i have disturbed a few empty ones around the garden. I try not to disturb them because bumble bees like to use them.

I didn't know Bumblies, like the old mouse holes, we've got a few around the garden...

Queens mate in Autumn and then hibernate alone before producing young. I copy an extract from the website - http://www.bumblebee.org/lifecycle.htm
(It is a very interesting read and although Einstein did not say humans would disapper in only four years if we got rid of bees without them we will all be a lot hungrier).
The queens found the new colony themselves.
Queens search for a suitable nest site; deserted small rodent nests, dead, tussocky grass, and the base of untidy hedges are popular sites. It is unfortunate that tidy gardeners often destroy what a queen would regard as a highly desirable residence. It is at this time that you most commonly find bumblebees straying into your house and behaving strangely. They will investigate any dark corner, flying slowly and sometimes even disappearing down holes, or even into pockets. They seem oblivious to their surroundings, and not at all interested in flowers. These are queens looking for a safe site to begin the colony. Once a queen has found a suitable site she builds a wax honey pot and fills it with
regurgitated nectar (honey). The wax for the honey pot is exuded from between the segments of the abdomen. The queen also builds up a store of pollen, some of this she eats, and the rest she forms into a ball moistening it with nectar, this is sometimes called "bee bread". This store will enable the queen to survive a day or two of bad weather without foraging. So any queen found carrying pollen in her pollen baskets has already found a suitable nest site.

Thanks Sg ....very interesting...what shape are the cones that she makes, do you know...I'll keep a look out for them...

Cones? sorry I'm not with you.I have been back to look at the link again and not seen cones mentioned.

and the base of untidy hedges are popular sites. It is unfortunate that tidy gardeners often destroy what a queen would regard as a highly desirable residence. It is at this time that
------------------------------------------------------
It was this quote Sg that made me think that she built a little cone shape nest, I have found something similar towards the base of a Spirea that OH was starting to prune...
Sorry....senior excitement again lol.....

I see where you are coming from now. The following link is to a very on line newsletter celebrating Native America.
http://www.turtletrack.org/Issues02/Co07272002/CO_07272002_Buffalo_Mouse.htm
I have copied a small extract from it for you.

Most field mice live in underground burrows. The burrows are fairly complicated and may include nest chambers and food stores. Burrows probably survive from one generation to the next and will be enlarged or modified as required. Nests are commonly made of leaves, moss and grass. They are usually built below ground under the roots of shrubs or trees but occasionally are found in holes in trees, buildings and bird or dormouse nest boxes. Additional nesting material is used in autumn and winter and often the mouse blocks the entrance to the burrow with leaves, twigs or stones.

What OH uncovered is probably just such a des res for her.

Thanks...:))) what a mine of info you are....:)))

The internet is a great tool.

Sure is, I love it when I've got a bit of time, just reading up on thing of interest.....

I'm a bit undisciplined I'm afraid and will go chasing things and suddenly wake up to the fact that i have spent 2-3 hours trawling. I am trying hard to curtail my forays to my coffee breaks. instead of a biscuit or bit of cake I have a computer foray. lol.

Oh the poor little things. The number of times I have rescued mice (& geckos & lizards when I lived in W. Africa) & birds off our cats. As we had one of our bengal cats mysteriously disappear without trace about 3 years ago, we now keep our other two bengal girls totally indoors (sad for them, but great for my peace of my mind, & even greater for the bird community in our garden). Tammy was a prolific hunter, & I used to dread spring, when she would appear at least once a day with a live baby bird in her mouth. Now that she is fully indoors, I don't have the heartbreak of all of that any more. Our 11 year old cat Rosie, continues to be an indoor/outdoor girl, as she never wonders off the property (bengals wonder all over the neighbourhood & Tammy only just avoided being hit on the road twice that I witnessed). Rosie likes to think she can grab a bird or two, but thankfully she is too slow for them now. I do hope at least the little one survived in the field. We can only do our best at times like these. I hate Nov 5th because of the hedgehogs who get caught in those bonfires.

If we gave our big ginger tom a row for anything he would present us with a dead mouse as a way of apologising I think. The mice had been blatantly digging up and eating my tulip bulbs in front of us and i was getting very frustrated with it. My OH and Avenger - he was already named when we chose him at the Cat Rescue Centre - were standing near when a mouse proceeded to eat a bulb. My husband said "Avenger what do you think we pay you for" because the bold lad was sitting, watching and enjoying the spectacle with his "DAD". Next morning we got a delivery of one mouse. There did not seem to be any way of stopping him. I dk what you can do about the hedgehogs getting caught in bonfires either. At least if the bonfires are civic ones they are built relatively late so there is less likelihood of that happening. Family bonfires are less common than they used to be. In UK most councils ban bonfires because of the need to fulfil there obligations under the new global warming prevention protocols.

I would have run a mile too..lol

LOL!