It's good and honest to say "it didn't work out for my mice/rats" Or "I tried it..for enrichment..but they were not that bothered"...OR " I will see if they like it (whatever it is..food, toys, enrichment) again some time later!" ❤❤❤ Love You're Honesty Emi!
We've been bioactive with our rats for 2.5 years and we absolutely love it. We seem to have struck lucky as our rats regularly dig and turn it, it doesn't dry out too much, and we don't get many gnats. I think it only works because we have a liberta explorer and are able to have accessories higher up, out of the way of the soil, plus we have litter trays and a large shelf of wood shavings. They also mostly pee where they sleep as they're old and lazy 😂, so very little waste actually goes into the soil.
I tried bio with my rats, I gave up after a few months, the smell was bad but more than that the dirt was EVERYWHERE in a way no other bedding ever seems to be 😂
@Emiology in the process of trying this myself, I have my own native raised isopods, spingtails, and earthworms. So I'll give this a crack. But I definitely wouldn't go to deep with soil just due to water logged soil and it allows the clean up crew to spread quickly. I've done bio active setups with snakes, chameleons, and dubia roaches. All have been successful, if I'm successful I'd love to share the research with you. So you can make a video on it.
@@LoneWolf-dx4heI’ve never heard of a “dubia” roach, I hate ALL roaches & bugs except for ladybugs 🐞 so I can’t imagine keeping them as pets, omg…not judging you, I just couldn’t …and I’ve learned that ppl keep baby crabs as pets, I don’t get that either! I’m just now getting used to mice only because 2 got in my home & I’ve made the surviving one my pet.
I definitely could not do a bioactive enclosure for my pets. Just the soil and the bugs would make me not want my rats anywhere near it. I do understand the cleaning reasons as I am also chronically ill. I do think the bioactive is so pretty tho. Natural cages are so cute!
Im so sorry it didnt work out.. Its so heartbreaking when you go through this much care to keep many different species alive (including plants) only for it to go wrong and have to redo everything or not do it again😢
Thanks for sharing your experience. I had a few bioactive mouse tanks for a while that were successful. I had springtails and compost worms. I never had to change the soil, the CUC took care of the waste really well. I didnt use any wooden toys or hides, just some apple branches that I hung up out of the soil. I gave them hay to nest with and also used hoppers to keep their food out of the soil. One day the tanks got infested with grain mites that came with the food though, unfortunately. After that I decided to go back to regular bedding as I hated having to essentially kill all the creatures in the soil to get rid of the grain mites. I saved as many worms as I could find but there was no way to pick out all the springtails 😢 I agree that bioactive is still a lot of work. Turning and dampening the soil had to be done several times a week and disturbing the CUC so often is not ideal for them to thrive. For me it was definitely a money saver, after the initial cost of set up, there was very little cost involved in maintaining it. I didnt have any trouble with smell as you did. It smelled fresh and clean all the time. I didnt like the limitations in decorating the enclosure when I was using soil. Like yours, my set ups would look pretty barren after a few days. The mice did seem to love it though and built huge tunnel systems. Its a shame it didnt work out for you.
thank you so much for making this!! i’ve seen a lot of people trying bioactive with mice & even hamsters recently. i’m not convinced by the perfect images online and there are definitely associated risks that not everyone takes into account.
@@kellygalvin7775 Hamsters also have very sensitive respiratory systems and cannot regulate their temperature well so the damp soil is a risk. I haven’t seen an example of a hamster bioactive enclosure that is both suitable in terms of meeting their needs as well as safe :(
@@megan-ui3hq I’m referring to them being generally cleaner and solitary, I had seen some nice examples on the bio active forums but that was a while ago so don’t know if any have had them for a long time
@@megan-ui3hq All small animals have very sensitive respiratory systems-- hamsters, mice, rats, and hedgehogs are all animals I've kept and you'll read that about all of them. I do wonder how wild hamsters manage, since the soil is damp once you go down a few inches.
I love (semi-)bioactive for my rats so far. I think its helped getting mature soil rather than starting from scratch. I also think getting isopods/springtails and keeping a colony helps to cut the costs when it comes to replacing them. I definitely think though that it's easier with rats as the whole bio-load isn't going directing into the soil. I've had a few days where it smelt funny, but most of them were right at the beginning. You gave it a good shot, just with any 'normal' substrate, not everything works for everyone.
bioactive with rodents is very hard and advanced. It needs to be a very deep enclosure, with a drainage layer (very hard with digging animals) and lots and lots of plants, germination seeds, a growth light etc. and the amount of animals for the space needs to be controlled. So don't feel bad that you didn't got it, it is not as easy as with reptiles
Really pleased you tried this now I won’t have to. That just looks like way too much trouble for me, I’ll stick to bedding but thanks for the video it was really useful.
When I first got my rats I had a bioactive closure however, it was very rare for them to actually dig in the soil and they didn’t like spending time on it and managed to bury everything I put on the floor of the cage and all of the hammocks and ropes covered in Cocoa, fibre. I also really struggled to keep the soil moist since the rat cage didn’t hold in any humidity. And hundreds of fungus nats.However, I know lots of people that have had lots of success with bioactive rat enclosures
It's always a shame when a set up doesn't work. I had a bioactive for my bearded dragon but had to go back to my old set up a few weeks ago. It unfortunately just didn't work as expected. I hope to try again in the future, though!
Oh my rats are and have been bioactive for years, best thing I ever did just once every few mos I top off with springtails that breed themselves in the container I got the first set of initially I feed them yeast n they just live n multiply I can't smell nothing I love it
Immediately when i saw the first video i was very sceptical exactly because of the very heavy bio load and lack of plans. There is absolutely no way it can ever really work with out the plants. Sure i have a bio active roach colonies without any plants, but i circulate the substrate with my heavy planted low bio load snake enclosure.
Yep. Would work a lot better with a larger, planted, iluminated and less populated enclosure - the bioload would be distributed on a larger area, and the cleanup crew could keep up better. A larger enclosure would have more space, and make it possible to have more (fast growing!) plants. Also, plants use waste/nutrients, and moisture, to grow - and in the progress they remove harmful substances. Personally I'd want the enclosure to be taller, the upper part having wire/bar walls. The enclosure would ventilate better, and the nests and nesting material could be higher up and stay dry. I love how live plants look, and they are also something to do in an enclosure. Sure, it may be annoying to have the micr wreak havoc, dig them up, eat them, rip them... But that's great enrichment, and hey, live plants are a healthy low fat diet choice 😊 And yeah -- if the bioload is heavy like here, the substrate would definitely need more regular (partial) changing.
Thank you for being honest and also for mentioning the fact that you can't release non-native animals/plants/etc outside. No one ever talks about how important that is, and how the pet trade (among other industries) has often destroyed ecosystems, decimated super important species and forever damaged the soil and what you can grow in it by people releasing their pets, or CUC in this case, and I wonder if this new trend of bioactive enclosures is already unknowingly affecting the UK's animals/plants/soil. I asked about how to safely dispose of the soil in one of the facebook groups and some people said you should dry it out in the oven, batch by batch, to make sure all the CUC is dead. I would look into and contact your local garbage disposal services to make sure they burn it. Idk how those things work in the UK but where I live there are several ways you can dispose of different things, and medicine or other objects that are dangerous or can't be recycled get burned. You just gotta know if you should call them and they pick up the bag, or you should go to a specific facility, etc.
I did something similar (but less permanent) with only 2 mice. We didn't have any creepy crawlies in there but we just used dirt and hay instead of bedding, and sticks and wood instead of anything plastic. I would change it all about every 2 months, but sometimes 3 months. The main benefit asides from less cost was that the smell of the mice was much less with dirt, compared to commercial bedding. In fact, the mice really didn't smell at all. But it was a largish cage with only 2 mice as I said. Also, we live on a farm and have unlimited hay, dirt and branches to use
I've been working on setting up half a semi-bioactive enclosure ever since your first video came out. It's still very much in the works because I first had to "renovate" the whole cage (it's a diy one and had some flaws I really wanted to get rid of) and currently it's at the stage where I've got soil in there with springtails and dwarf white isopods, as well as I'm breeding a bigger species of isopods in a little display terrarium (that I fell in love with). The springtails in the mouse cage are super active but the population is still not big enough and I'm currently facing slight issues with mold in there, so I'm just kinda waiting for the population to grow even bigger. I've also simply got issues with my rats atm (some passed, group is too small so I'm working on getting some new girls) and don't have time to spend on a "side project" that can also wait some longer, like the (almost) emtpy mouse cage. The reason I hope this might have a chance at working out for me is that my cage is a two level one and I'm setting this all up in the bottom, while the top will still be regular bedding. From my experience, my mice so far preferred the top level to sleep and spend most of their day while kinda treating the bottom as some kind of adventure playground, so this is exactly how I'll be treating the semi-bioactive area: a very naturalistic mouse playground. Lots of stuff to explore and climb on and treats to find and all that, but less hides they'd like to sleep in (of course there will still be hides, but their favourites and the big ones will be on the top level), meaning there will hopefully be less waste overall, making it A LOT more realistic that it could have a chance at working out The issue of what to do when changing out some of the soil because of the CUC in there if I do end up having to change some out regardless, is something I'm still very unsure of yet, ngl. But I'll see when I get to that
@@Emiology yeah, my plan would be ruined if they did, but I'll only find out if I try and considering they've got a whole staircase to run down to that level, I've got hope they are too lazy for that ^^' I'd love to see if you ever do end up doing just one half! Until then, I'm sure your mice will very much appreciate the dig boxes too Oh btw, did you end up finding a solution on how to get rid of the soul properly? I'd be very curious on what you end(ed) up doing
Thanks for this video. I've previously been interested in bioactive for my rats and hedgehog but had not figured out how to make it work with the space and enclosures I have available. Needing to change the soil out completely defeats the purpose of it, and aspen bedding is a heck of a lot lighter than soil lol. It's good to know the downsides to this approach. As far as the soil you've pulled out-- you'd need to bake and/or freeze it to be able to dump it outside or in the trash. If you wanted to try to save as many isopods or springtails as possible and create your own cultures of them, you could put something like a raw piece of potato or other food source in there, leave overnight, then transfer any isopods or springtails to their new enclosure. Do this for a few days/with a few pieces and once you have as many as you can get, freeze/bake the soil. An isopod facebook group might be able to provide more specific advice. They can be fun to keep all on their own! I have several varieties.
Worked well for me with rats, but big diggers and making sure they can't stash anything and aren't food stashers is key. Getting lucky with a microbiome and getting excessive amounts of springtails in Initially also helped. I didn't have to do a replacement in the more than year I had the bio set up, but I did also pick through and turn every week to make sure everything was well distributed. Plants are really hard, but you can get a full nitrogen cycle without them if you get lucky and don't have too much load on the soil.
I was waiting for this video! I was thinking of trying a bioactive setup during the summer but I think I’ll hold off since I’m nowhere nearly as patient as you 😂 I managed to litter train my mice by putting their dirty bedding in specific hides, eventually cleaning them every day + keeping them in the same spot for a few months. Now they go in any ceramic hide I put in their cage but as my boys age they’ve started peeing in their nest too 😅
I got the bio-active thing to basically work. When I first tried it I just used dirt and grass from the yard. This didn't work because of all the bugs which got out and infested the house. The next step was to get "clean" dirt in bags from Home Depot and sod from Home Depot. This worked better, the mice tunneled, and the grass did OK. Outside bugs found their way in plus, presumably, bugs from the not exactly "clean" Home Depot dirt. After a week or so, the ammonia intense urine from the mice killed the grass. I started ordering the special (live) sod sold on Amazon that people use as natural litterbins for their dogs and cats. I guess this grass has been engineered or selected to handle ammonia better. I soak it with a hose before laying it down and add water if it is dry. I can get 1 or 2 months out of the sod before the ammonia kills it. Also, the sod is not designed to be a permanent plant and once the nutrients with which it had been infused are gone, the grass dies. The sod does not extend roots to the underlying soil to any great extent. I use a little watering can to sprinkle water in the morning to de-concentrate the ammonia to a certain extent. I can extend the life of the sod by fertilizing it with beer (This is the only proper use for the super-cheap Bud Lite these days. Explaining that it is being used to fertilize grass in a mouse cage lowers any raised eyebrows). The alcohol in the beer evaporates away quickly and doesn't harm the mice. As too much beer will make the area smell like a frat house bathroom on Sunday morning for a couple of days moderation is recommended. I can get another 2 or 3 extra weeks from the sod using the beer. I have the enclosure surrounded by grow lights on a timer so that the lights are off in the evening and go off and on during the day so the mice can have a normal diurnal schedule with periods of shade during the day to grab snacks or water, etc. One quarter of the habitant is closed off without plants and just dirt with hides and an alternate water-bottle and a little daily food so that they have a source of food, water and shelter that are always dark and/or shaded. Occasionally I'll get an infestation of fruit flies. On these occasions I cover the habitat with mosquito netting until the infestation passes. (1 or 2 days). It is necessary to be cautious with the mosquito netting because baby mice will climb up and get caught in it! They're not harmed and give the cutest guilty looks when extracted from their inadvertent confinement. I never have any smell issues even when the grass is on its last legs although I never leave it to completely die because the desiccated, dry and forlorn aspect is rather doldrumic.
I love the idea of these setups but it's important to keep in mind how much space mice or rats would have for their territory in the wild. The square footage of our cages are a fraction of the size that even a single mouse or rat would have in the wild. As an ecologist I don't see how a single cage could support enough life to mimic the natural processes found in a healthy ecosystem. Especially since the cage is a mostly closed system while the territory of a mouse or rat in the wild would be an open system that would allow waste to leave the system. You can optimize it some but I think it would take a room sized enclosure to have a chance of making it work where no soil replacement was needed. And even then you would likely need to limit the number of mice or rats to just a few.
I loved going bioactive for my rats, but I would probably stop as well if my experience was similar to yours. Would you ever switch the rats over to bioactive? I think the smell might be better since rats don't live in the soil the same way as mice, I assume the ammonia build-up wouldn't be as bad then?
Bioactive is not for everyone, especially not for people who are impatient or with anxiety. It's often difficult for some of us to just sit back and not do a thing. For those that want to try, here's my experience to a successful bioactive enclosure. 1. I don't use just use store-bought dirt for my bioactive set ups. I use coconut coir, store soil, sand, vermicompost, carbonized rice hull and OLD BEDDING (to feed the growing amount of nitrifying bacteria).The consistency is light, retains water, amazing to be make tunnels and, overtime, breaks down. And no, you don't change the soil. You add more as you notice the level is decreasing as it is broken down. The poop is eaten by the clean up crew or buried and the pee is absorbed by the soil and plants. By "changing the soil" you are throwing out the good nitrifying bacteria and unnecessarily making yourself do more work and ruining the forming balance of the system. 2. I don't put the mice right away to prevent too much increase in ammonia while the system is trying to establish itself and it's also cruel. Once added, there shouldn't be a smell or, if there is one it's only a small amount that should be taken cared of by adding more substrate on top. Over time, the substrate below will produce more nitrifying bacteria then mixed by the mice burrowing after they are introduced. By adding the boost, you may make the system imbalanced.. 3. I also don't initially put live plants, I use seeds with half being catgrass. Grass is hardy and will forever be present to take up excess nutrients. Since the soil is seeded and not all seeds will germinate at once, there's no fear of having no plants. And you can always spread seeds which the mice can either forage or leave to germinate. Will the mice destroy them? Yes. But it's grass, you just need a rhizome from a shredded root and it'll grow back. 4. Bioactive needs time, a month or two of no mice is crucial. You add things slowly. Sometimes days to weeks apart. Starting from small (i.e. bacteria in the soil) then going bigger (springtails and worms) and bigger (arthropods) before finally getting to the largest creature in the enclosure (mice). This may take a minimum of 2 months depending on how the set up is doing.
I've always wondered about bioactive for small mammals! Great video! For the used soil, you could freeze or bake it to kill off the cleanup crew and make it safe for the environment. Also, did you ever add any carbon to the soil?
I like aspen wood bedding too much to really ever try bioactive lol. Mice seem to enjoy it too with all their tunnels. But it is nice to know the difficulties of trying bioactive for mice. Maybe you can use the used soil for potted plants and then reuse the soil for the cage once the ammonia clears out?
Thank you for your update. I've been considering trying a bioactive enclosure so I'm glad for your honest update, I think I will stay away from this option. My mice are doing very well with a good deep layer of aspen bedding so I will just keep going with that. 👍
I do suspect your comments about litter training have a lot to do with it. I went bioactive for the rats 3 years ago, and it's the best thing I've ever done for them! Better for their respiratory health and my allergy, as well as being less wasteful and way more enriching for them. I'm definitely a convert for rats, but the litter training does help. Out of interest, you said its worked for your harvest mice - what do you think the difference is there?
The harvest mice produce way less waste than the fancy mice compared to their size and their pee doesn’t seem to be anywhere near the levels of ammonia that the fancy mice produce, I think it gave the setup a slower start but it also can handle their level of waste 🙂
Thanks for sharing this! I'd wondered for a while if there was a way to make it work, I've been curious but wasn't sure if it would be possible to do it properly with destructive rodents. I think for me I'll probably stick with good absorbent hemp, I've finally found a good dupe for hemparade: ProRep hemp bedding!☺ for my gerbils I mix it with LOADS of hay as well as a decent amount of carefresh/kaytee and they're able to make some really awesome tunnels and caverns with it 🥰
I am also skeptical about bioactive for mice. My crested geckos have a bioactive enclosure and it's great, but it's obviously much easier to have living plants in a gecko enclosure. The only thing that I noticed that you didn't mention: I saw a recommendation on a hamster bioactive enclosure to plant edible, fast growing plants and put terrarium domes over them while they are growing. Either way, it's way too much work/trial and error if you have other pets to take care of imo
Unfortunately even for well established plants like spider plants within a day or two they completely shred the leaves and the roots and all your hard work is undone 🥲
@@Emiology Oh, I know. That's why I thought it was an interesting idea to put a bottomless glass terrarium over the plants. Of course they can tunnel under it and eat the roots and eventually get into the terrarium, but it's less accessible.
I got 3 mice about a week ago, but everytime i put my hand in their enclosure to get them used to me they ignore me. I've tried hand feeding them snacks and they just take the food and hide. What can i do to get them to warm up to me more ?
Did this with the gerbils, not only was the smell horrible it made the hay a little damp and clearly uncomfortable to sleep in and I felt bad, not only that they kept kicking it all over stuff and it would stick and stain their toys and platforms, it looked nice for the 1 day I had it 😰
I think the enclosure was to small compared to the amount of pee and poop fancy mice produce. I keep 3 groups of Lemniscomys striatus on bioactive soil, with all the little creatures in it. But the enclosures are 4 to 7sqm in floor size, and have a lot more members in the cleaning company. I think if you wanna do it with fancy mice, you also need an enclosure, thats a couple sqm big. And you shouldn‘t place the wood stands directly in the bedding. I have a friend who likes pottery and she made a lot of ceramic stilts for all my wooden levels. Another thing is you need is a dewatering ground under the main soil , if you want that enclosure works long term(i don‘t know the english name of it), like expended clay (?) and a mesh over it… but that leeds so the problem, that fancy mice like to dig a lot. And I’m not sure how two fancy mice proof it…Lemniscomys don‘t really dig tunnels, so the bottom is safe.
Ok for some reason my comment keeps getting erased but YOU GUYS. We could probably use a diatomite bath mat / coasters to make a drainage layer, it’s too heavy for them to move and is basically like another floor. PLEASE someone tell me if you try this!!!
Do you use any protectant on the wooden items you put in the mouse enclosures (bioactive or regular)? I'm trying to figure out if theres something I can do to increase the longevity of these items since eventually they get peed on too much.
You can also do a vinegar soak and let it dry in sunlight, often to remove scent. I had a bioactive set up for rats, which worked really well, cut smell and time for me.
I noticed you used top soil as the base. In researching this for rats we are planning to get, everything suggested using coco peat which is soiless, and stays better aerated. I haven't seen anything recommending actual dirt. Do you think this could have contributed to the issues?
I used coco soil and top soil. Coco soil by itself usually isn’t that great when creating a bioactive for a lot of animals as it’s not good for plant growth, for animals not having plants it matters less but I believe it’s still not as good for harbouring beneficial bacteria etc
Oh, I just kind of assumed people were using native insects when I first saw this concept. Or at the very least, insect species that absolutely cannot survive outside. It's actually shocking to me that anyone can just buy insects that could become a major hazard to the environment!? I'm sure there are plenty of people who won't think twice about dumping them outside, regardless what the packaging says... -.-
People have access all the time to feeder insects like mealworms for their reptiles that shouldn’t be released outside but probably do if they get thrown away etc
Hey I have a question! If you are with your mice for at least 2 days a week, and every other weekend.. is that enough time? My parents are divorced, so we divided the time with each parent. I can have my dad feed them when I am gone and give them water, but Will I have enough time with them? I want to know before I ask
It should be fine as long as their needs are still being met, most mice aren’t too fussed about being handled every day as long as they have each other for company 😊
Hi I might be getting a rat and I’ve been watching your videos and getting all the nessessary things but I have a cage I might be getting I’m not sure if it’s a good size though, it only says it’s a 94 cm four tier cage with two doors. Would it be good for rats ?
Im finding it hard to find a substrate that doesn't smell of pee. My new boys pee for England. Isumu mom has recommended bedmax. Im thinking mixing that with my clean n cozy ?
I'm not keen on bioactive enclosures for rodents, as you mentioned you do need to keep the substrate moist - which can encourage mould and on that, skin/respiratory infections. Failing that, accidentally inhaled/ingested debris can cause respiratory and/or digestive problems such as colon compaction or anal prolapse. You're brave for trying though! When you set up a bioactive enclosure, isopods need to be established in their environment before you add other animals (I suggest lizards, geckos and invertebrates which benefit from a slightly moist environment, not rodents.) Before anyone argues about that's how they live in the wild, they don't have a limited space and have lots of other animals maintaining their ecosystem, they have loads of plants to bind the soil so that it's less likely they will ingest or inhale debris when they tunnel. In this case, adding plants is a no - because you mentioned you will constantly be replacing them from being damaged from chewing. I've come to the conclusion that the people who claim to have a bioactive environment for rodents are either lying, paying out a fortune and creating a lot of waste or may have/get sick animals.
hi i was wondering if you could look into the holy thursday massacre that recently happened in florida, its such an atrocity that i wish more people were talking about
@@Emiology uuugh that sucks! I was hoping to build one of those crazy detailed terrariums like people build for their reptiles with real plants and waterfalls and stuff and putting a rat or a couple mice in it 😔
@@its_me-nikki If you want rats you need to have at least two, three is ideal to start off with. Rats are social animals and will get lonely and depressed if they don't have other rats to live with. They can form bonds with humans but nothing can replace living with other rats. You can make really beautiful natural-looking setups for mice and rats with real wood branches to climb on. There are sellers on etsy who make hammocks with a leafy woodland theme, it's just that real plants wouldn't last long.
@@Emiology mice and rats are two different animals, that's why. They are rodents but they are not sister species. That's why you can't have male mice with each other but male rats have to have other friends.
Also to add substrates are not made for mice they can hurt the respiratory system, yes the mice they were selectively breed from can deal with it because they are weather to do so for centuries but fancy mice cannot due to selectively breeding for temperament for hundreds of years.
It's good and honest to say "it didn't work out for my mice/rats"
Or "I tried it..for enrichment..but they were not that bothered"...OR " I will see if they like it (whatever it is..food, toys, enrichment) again some time later!"
❤❤❤ Love You're Honesty Emi!
We've been bioactive with our rats for 2.5 years and we absolutely love it. We seem to have struck lucky as our rats regularly dig and turn it, it doesn't dry out too much, and we don't get many gnats. I think it only works because we have a liberta explorer and are able to have accessories higher up, out of the way of the soil, plus we have litter trays and a large shelf of wood shavings. They also mostly pee where they sleep as they're old and lazy 😂, so very little waste actually goes into the soil.
I tried bio with my rats, I gave up after a few months, the smell was bad but more than that the dirt was EVERYWHERE in a way no other bedding ever seems to be 😂
That would drive me mad lol it’s bad enough with just their dig box having mud up the walls 🫣
@Emiology in the process of trying this myself, I have my own native raised isopods, spingtails, and earthworms. So I'll give this a crack. But I definitely wouldn't go to deep with soil just due to water logged soil and it allows the clean up crew to spread quickly. I've done bio active setups with snakes, chameleons, and dubia roaches. All have been successful, if I'm successful I'd love to share the research with you. So you can make a video on it.
@@LoneWolf-dx4he Mice need at least 6 inches of substrate to dig and burrow in is the only thing :)
@@Emiology true and I'd add more soil later after the cleanup crew thrives in the shallow soil.
@@LoneWolf-dx4heI’ve never heard of a “dubia” roach, I hate ALL roaches & bugs except for ladybugs 🐞 so I can’t imagine keeping them as pets, omg…not judging you, I just couldn’t …and I’ve learned that ppl keep baby crabs as pets, I don’t get that either! I’m just now getting used to mice only because 2 got in my home & I’ve made the surviving one my pet.
I definitely could not do a bioactive enclosure for my pets. Just the soil and the bugs would make me not want my rats anywhere near it. I do understand the cleaning reasons as I am also chronically ill. I do think the bioactive is so pretty tho. Natural cages are so cute!
Same here!!
Im so sorry it didnt work out.. Its so heartbreaking when you go through this much care to keep many different species alive (including plants) only for it to go wrong and have to redo everything or not do it again😢
Thanks for sharing your experience. I had a few bioactive mouse tanks for a while that were successful. I had springtails and compost worms. I never had to change the soil, the CUC took care of the waste really well. I didnt use any wooden toys or hides, just some apple branches that I hung up out of the soil. I gave them hay to nest with and also used hoppers to keep their food out of the soil. One day the tanks got infested with grain mites that came with the food though, unfortunately. After that I decided to go back to regular bedding as I hated having to essentially kill all the creatures in the soil to get rid of the grain mites. I saved as many worms as I could find but there was no way to pick out all the springtails 😢
I agree that bioactive is still a lot of work. Turning and dampening the soil had to be done several times a week and disturbing the CUC so often is not ideal for them to thrive.
For me it was definitely a money saver, after the initial cost of set up, there was very little cost involved in maintaining it.
I didnt have any trouble with smell as you did. It smelled fresh and clean all the time.
I didnt like the limitations in decorating the enclosure when I was using soil. Like yours, my set ups would look pretty barren after a few days. The mice did seem to love it though and built huge tunnel systems. Its a shame it didnt work out for you.
thank you so much for making this!! i’ve seen a lot of people trying bioactive with mice & even hamsters recently. i’m not convinced by the perfect images online and there are definitely associated risks that not everyone takes into account.
Yes I worry about mould spores because of the moist soil.
I think it may work better with a hamster
@@kellygalvin7775 Hamsters also have very sensitive respiratory systems and cannot regulate their temperature well so the damp soil is a risk. I haven’t seen an example of a hamster bioactive enclosure that is both suitable in terms of meeting their needs as well as safe :(
@@megan-ui3hq I’m referring to them being generally cleaner and solitary, I had seen some nice examples on the bio active forums but that was a while ago so don’t know if any have had them for a long time
@@megan-ui3hq All small animals have very sensitive respiratory systems-- hamsters, mice, rats, and hedgehogs are all animals I've kept and you'll read that about all of them. I do wonder how wild hamsters manage, since the soil is damp once you go down a few inches.
I love (semi-)bioactive for my rats so far. I think its helped getting mature soil rather than starting from scratch. I also think getting isopods/springtails and keeping a colony helps to cut the costs when it comes to replacing them. I definitely think though that it's easier with rats as the whole bio-load isn't going directing into the soil. I've had a few days where it smelt funny, but most of them were right at the beginning. You gave it a good shot, just with any 'normal' substrate, not everything works for everyone.
bioactive with rodents is very hard and advanced. It needs to be a very deep enclosure, with a drainage layer (very hard with digging animals) and lots and lots of plants, germination seeds, a growth light etc. and the amount of animals for the space needs to be controlled. So don't feel bad that you didn't got it, it is not as easy as with reptiles
It’s a shame it didn’t work out, but it’s good that you put your mice’s health and also your health first. 😊
Really pleased you tried this now I won’t have to. That just looks like way too much trouble for me, I’ll stick to bedding but thanks for the video it was really useful.
When I first got my rats I had a bioactive closure however, it was very rare for them to actually dig in the soil and they didn’t like spending time on it and managed to bury everything I put on the floor of the cage and all of the hammocks and ropes covered in Cocoa, fibre. I also really struggled to keep the soil moist since the rat cage didn’t hold in any humidity. And hundreds of fungus nats.However, I know lots of people that have had lots of success with bioactive rat enclosures
It's always a shame when a set up doesn't work. I had a bioactive for my bearded dragon but had to go back to my old set up a few weeks ago. It unfortunately just didn't work as expected. I hope to try again in the future, though!
As reptiles go Beardies tend to produce a lot of waste compared to others so I’m not surprised it would be a bit trickier 😫
Oh my rats are and have been bioactive for years, best thing I ever did just once every few mos I top off with springtails that breed themselves in the container I got the first set of initially I feed them yeast n they just live n multiply I can't smell nothing I love it
Hi Em! Lots of support from Italy, love your channel. Just so inspiring 😊🇮🇹
Immediately when i saw the first video i was very sceptical exactly because of the very heavy bio load and lack of plans. There is absolutely no way it can ever really work with out the plants. Sure i have a bio active roach colonies without any plants, but i circulate the substrate with my heavy planted low bio load snake enclosure.
Yep. Would work a lot better with a larger, planted, iluminated and less populated enclosure - the bioload would be distributed on a larger area, and the cleanup crew could keep up better. A larger enclosure would have more space, and make it possible to have more (fast growing!) plants.
Also, plants use waste/nutrients, and moisture, to grow - and in the progress they remove harmful substances.
Personally I'd want the enclosure to be taller, the upper part having wire/bar walls. The enclosure would ventilate better, and the nests and nesting material could be higher up and stay dry.
I love how live plants look, and they are also something to do in an enclosure. Sure, it may be annoying to have the micr wreak havoc, dig them up, eat them, rip them...
But that's great enrichment, and hey, live plants are a healthy low fat diet choice 😊
And yeah -- if the bioload is heavy like here, the substrate would definitely need more regular (partial) changing.
Thank you for being honest and also for mentioning the fact that you can't release non-native animals/plants/etc outside.
No one ever talks about how important that is, and how the pet trade (among other industries) has often destroyed ecosystems, decimated super important species and forever damaged the soil and what you can grow in it by people releasing their pets, or CUC in this case, and I wonder if this new trend of bioactive enclosures is already unknowingly affecting the UK's animals/plants/soil.
I asked about how to safely dispose of the soil in one of the facebook groups and some people said you should dry it out in the oven, batch by batch, to make sure all the CUC is dead. I would look into and contact your local garbage disposal services to make sure they burn it. Idk how those things work in the UK but where I live there are several ways you can dispose of different things, and medicine or other objects that are dangerous or can't be recycled get burned. You just gotta know if you should call them and they pick up the bag, or you should go to a specific facility, etc.
I did something similar (but less permanent) with only 2 mice. We didn't have any creepy crawlies in there but we just used dirt and hay instead of bedding, and sticks and wood instead of anything plastic. I would change it all about every 2 months, but sometimes 3 months. The main benefit asides from less cost was that the smell of the mice was much less with dirt, compared to commercial bedding. In fact, the mice really didn't smell at all. But it was a largish cage with only 2 mice as I said. Also, we live on a farm and have unlimited hay, dirt and branches to use
I've been working on setting up half a semi-bioactive enclosure ever since your first video came out. It's still very much in the works because I first had to "renovate" the whole cage (it's a diy one and had some flaws I really wanted to get rid of) and currently it's at the stage where I've got soil in there with springtails and dwarf white isopods, as well as I'm breeding a bigger species of isopods in a little display terrarium (that I fell in love with). The springtails in the mouse cage are super active but the population is still not big enough and I'm currently facing slight issues with mold in there, so I'm just kinda waiting for the population to grow even bigger. I've also simply got issues with my rats atm (some passed, group is too small so I'm working on getting some new girls) and don't have time to spend on a "side project" that can also wait some longer, like the (almost) emtpy mouse cage. The reason I hope this might have a chance at working out for me is that my cage is a two level one and I'm setting this all up in the bottom, while the top will still be regular bedding. From my experience, my mice so far preferred the top level to sleep and spend most of their day while kinda treating the bottom as some kind of adventure playground, so this is exactly how I'll be treating the semi-bioactive area: a very naturalistic mouse playground. Lots of stuff to explore and climb on and treats to find and all that, but less hides they'd like to sleep in (of course there will still be hides, but their favourites and the big ones will be on the top level), meaning there will hopefully be less waste overall, making it A LOT more realistic that it could have a chance at working out
The issue of what to do when changing out some of the soil because of the CUC in there if I do end up having to change some out regardless, is something I'm still very unsure of yet, ngl. But I'll see when I get to that
Hopefully they don’t decide the bottom is the best place for the toilet 😅 I’d happily maybe do half in the future but it’s dig boxes only for now
@@Emiology yeah, my plan would be ruined if they did, but I'll only find out if I try and considering they've got a whole staircase to run down to that level, I've got hope they are too lazy for that ^^'
I'd love to see if you ever do end up doing just one half! Until then, I'm sure your mice will very much appreciate the dig boxes too
Oh btw, did you end up finding a solution on how to get rid of the soul properly? I'd be very curious on what you end(ed) up doing
Everyone says freeze it but we have a tiny freezer that can only just fit the food we need 💀
Thanks for this video. I've previously been interested in bioactive for my rats and hedgehog but had not figured out how to make it work with the space and enclosures I have available. Needing to change the soil out completely defeats the purpose of it, and aspen bedding is a heck of a lot lighter than soil lol. It's good to know the downsides to this approach.
As far as the soil you've pulled out-- you'd need to bake and/or freeze it to be able to dump it outside or in the trash. If you wanted to try to save as many isopods or springtails as possible and create your own cultures of them, you could put something like a raw piece of potato or other food source in there, leave overnight, then transfer any isopods or springtails to their new enclosure. Do this for a few days/with a few pieces and once you have as many as you can get, freeze/bake the soil. An isopod facebook group might be able to provide more specific advice. They can be fun to keep all on their own! I have several varieties.
Worked well for me with rats, but big diggers and making sure they can't stash anything and aren't food stashers is key. Getting lucky with a microbiome and getting excessive amounts of springtails in Initially also helped. I didn't have to do a replacement in the more than year I had the bio set up, but I did also pick through and turn every week to make sure everything was well distributed. Plants are really hard, but you can get a full nitrogen cycle without them if you get lucky and don't have too much load on the soil.
I was waiting for this video! I was thinking of trying a bioactive setup during the summer but I think I’ll hold off since I’m nowhere nearly as patient as you 😂 I managed to litter train my mice by putting their dirty bedding in specific hides, eventually cleaning them every day + keeping them in the same spot for a few months. Now they go in any ceramic hide I put in their cage but as my boys age they’ve started peeing in their nest too 😅
I got the bio-active thing to basically work. When I first tried it I just used dirt and grass from the yard. This didn't work because of all the bugs which got out and infested the house. The next step was to get "clean" dirt in bags from Home Depot and sod from Home Depot. This worked better, the mice tunneled, and the grass did OK. Outside bugs found their way in plus, presumably, bugs from the not exactly "clean" Home Depot dirt. After a week or so, the ammonia intense urine from the mice killed the grass. I started ordering the special (live) sod sold on Amazon that people use as natural litterbins for their dogs and cats. I guess this grass has been engineered or selected to handle ammonia better. I soak it with a hose before laying it down and add water if it is dry. I can get 1 or 2 months out of the sod before the ammonia kills it. Also, the sod is not designed to be a permanent plant and once the nutrients with which it had been infused are gone, the grass dies. The sod does not extend roots to the underlying soil to any great extent. I use a little watering can to sprinkle water in the morning to de-concentrate the ammonia to a certain extent. I can extend the life of the sod by fertilizing it with beer (This is the only proper use for the super-cheap Bud Lite these days. Explaining that it is being used to fertilize grass in a mouse cage lowers any raised eyebrows). The alcohol in the beer evaporates away quickly and doesn't harm the mice. As too much beer will make the area smell like a frat house bathroom on Sunday morning for a couple of days moderation is recommended. I can get another 2 or 3 extra weeks from the sod using the beer. I have the enclosure surrounded by grow lights on a timer so that the lights are off in the evening and go off and on during the day so the mice can have a normal diurnal schedule with periods of shade during the day to grab snacks or water, etc. One quarter of the habitant is closed off without plants and just dirt with hides and an alternate water-bottle and a little daily food so that they have a source of food, water and shelter that are always dark and/or shaded. Occasionally I'll get an infestation of fruit flies. On these occasions I cover the habitat with mosquito netting until the infestation passes. (1 or 2 days). It is necessary to be cautious with the mosquito netting because baby mice will climb up and get caught in it! They're not harmed and give the cutest guilty looks when extracted from their inadvertent confinement. I never have any smell issues even when the grass is on its last legs although I never leave it to completely die because the desiccated, dry and forlorn aspect is rather doldrumic.
Instead of beer, try a little yeast, that's what the beer is feeding things.
It always sucks when a set up doesn’t work 😭
I love the idea of these setups but it's important to keep in mind how much space mice or rats would have for their territory in the wild. The square footage of our cages are a fraction of the size that even a single mouse or rat would have in the wild. As an ecologist I don't see how a single cage could support enough life to mimic the natural processes found in a healthy ecosystem. Especially since the cage is a mostly closed system while the territory of a mouse or rat in the wild would be an open system that would allow waste to leave the system. You can optimize it some but I think it would take a room sized enclosure to have a chance of making it work where no soil replacement was needed. And even then you would likely need to limit the number of mice or rats to just a few.
I loved going bioactive for my rats, but I would probably stop as well if my experience was similar to yours. Would you ever switch the rats over to bioactive? I think the smell might be better since rats don't live in the soil the same way as mice, I assume the ammonia build-up wouldn't be as bad then?
Hi emiology I’m a massive fan of ur work my brother has 3 rats and I have 8 mice we also have a cat and a dog
Bioactive is not for everyone, especially not for people who are impatient or with anxiety. It's often difficult for some of us to just sit back and not do a thing. For those that want to try, here's my experience to a successful bioactive enclosure.
1. I don't use just use store-bought dirt for my bioactive set ups. I use coconut coir, store soil, sand, vermicompost, carbonized rice hull and OLD BEDDING (to feed the growing amount of nitrifying bacteria).The consistency is light, retains water, amazing to be make tunnels and, overtime, breaks down. And no, you don't change the soil. You add more as you notice the level is decreasing as it is broken down. The poop is eaten by the clean up crew or buried and the pee is absorbed by the soil and plants. By "changing the soil" you are throwing out the good nitrifying bacteria and unnecessarily making yourself do more work and ruining the forming balance of the system.
2. I don't put the mice right away to prevent too much increase in ammonia while the system is trying to establish itself and it's also cruel. Once added, there shouldn't be a smell or, if there is one it's only a small amount that should be taken cared of by adding more substrate on top. Over time, the substrate below will produce more nitrifying bacteria then mixed by the mice burrowing after they are introduced. By adding the boost, you may make the system imbalanced..
3. I also don't initially put live plants, I use seeds with half being catgrass. Grass is hardy and will forever be present to take up excess nutrients. Since the soil is seeded and not all seeds will germinate at once, there's no fear of having no plants. And you can always spread seeds which the mice can either forage or leave to germinate. Will the mice destroy them? Yes. But it's grass, you just need a rhizome from a shredded root and it'll grow back.
4. Bioactive needs time, a month or two of no mice is crucial. You add things slowly. Sometimes days to weeks apart. Starting from small (i.e. bacteria in the soil) then going bigger (springtails and worms) and bigger (arthropods) before finally getting to the largest creature in the enclosure (mice). This may take a minimum of 2 months depending on how the set up is doing.
A good review of your experience.
Appreciate your update, bummer. You're very sweet.
I've always wondered about bioactive for small mammals! Great video! For the used soil, you could freeze or bake it to kill off the cleanup crew and make it safe for the environment.
Also, did you ever add any carbon to the soil?
I like aspen wood bedding too much to really ever try bioactive lol. Mice seem to enjoy it too with all their tunnels. But it is nice to know the difficulties of trying bioactive for mice.
Maybe you can use the used soil for potted plants and then reuse the soil for the cage once the ammonia clears out?
I’d be afraid of mold and it getting too dry , I could see this working for smaller mice but not fancy mice
It works great for my Harvest mice, they barely produce any waste though
@@Emiology yeah, mabye for fancy mice you’d need an even bigger cage for it to work well, Atleast it works for them!
Thank you for your update. I've been considering trying a bioactive enclosure so I'm glad for your honest update, I think I will stay away from this option. My mice are doing very well with a good deep layer of aspen bedding so I will just keep going with that. 👍
I do suspect your comments about litter training have a lot to do with it. I went bioactive for the rats 3 years ago, and it's the best thing I've ever done for them! Better for their respiratory health and my allergy, as well as being less wasteful and way more enriching for them. I'm definitely a convert for rats, but the litter training does help.
Out of interest, you said its worked for your harvest mice - what do you think the difference is there?
The harvest mice produce way less waste than the fancy mice compared to their size and their pee doesn’t seem to be anywhere near the levels of ammonia that the fancy mice produce, I think it gave the setup a slower start but it also can handle their level of waste 🙂
@@Emiology that makes sense - I've never kept harvest mice, but I'd like to!
You definitely should! 😍 They’re so easy and lovely to watch
@@Emiology it's finding the space, I need a bigger house!
i love your videos so much!
Thanks for sharing this! I'd wondered for a while if there was a way to make it work, I've been curious but wasn't sure if it would be possible to do it properly with destructive rodents. I think for me I'll probably stick with good absorbent hemp, I've finally found a good dupe for hemparade: ProRep hemp bedding!☺ for my gerbils I mix it with LOADS of hay as well as a decent amount of carefresh/kaytee and they're able to make some really awesome tunnels and caverns with it 🥰
Bless the little Guinea Pigs and their Fosterer
...I'm sure you'll find them the best home eventually 💞💗
My rat is climbing on my head! ❤ I love your videos so much and really enjoy watching them!!
Ow her claws!! 😅
I am also skeptical about bioactive for mice. My crested geckos have a bioactive enclosure and it's great, but it's obviously much easier to have living plants in a gecko enclosure.
The only thing that I noticed that you didn't mention:
I saw a recommendation on a hamster bioactive enclosure to plant edible, fast growing plants and put terrarium domes over them while they are growing.
Either way, it's way too much work/trial and error if you have other pets to take care of imo
Unfortunately even for well established plants like spider plants within a day or two they completely shred the leaves and the roots and all your hard work is undone 🥲
@@Emiology Oh, I know. That's why I thought it was an interesting idea to put a bottomless glass terrarium over the plants. Of course they can tunnel under it and eat the roots and eventually get into the terrarium, but it's less accessible.
Oh no😭
I got 3 mice about a week ago, but everytime i put my hand in their enclosure to get them used to me they ignore me. I've tried hand feeding them snacks and they just take the food and hide. What can i do to get them to warm up to me more ?
Freeze the bedding you pulled out for a month to kill them off then you can dump em
Did this with the gerbils, not only was the smell horrible it made the hay a little damp and clearly uncomfortable to sleep in and I felt bad, not only that they kept kicking it all over stuff and it would stick and stain their toys and platforms, it looked nice for the 1 day I had it 😰
I think the enclosure was to small compared to the amount of pee and poop fancy mice produce. I keep 3 groups of Lemniscomys striatus on bioactive soil, with all the little creatures in it. But the enclosures are 4 to 7sqm in floor size, and have a lot more members in the cleaning company. I think if you wanna do it with fancy mice, you also need an enclosure, thats a couple sqm big. And you shouldn‘t place the wood stands directly in the bedding. I have a friend who likes pottery and she made a lot of ceramic stilts for all my wooden levels. Another thing is you need is a dewatering ground under the main soil , if you want that enclosure works long term(i don‘t know the english name of it), like expended clay (?) and a mesh over it… but that leeds so the problem, that fancy mice like to dig a lot. And I’m not sure how two fancy mice proof it…Lemniscomys don‘t really dig tunnels, so the bottom is safe.
Ok for some reason my comment keeps getting erased but YOU GUYS. We could probably use a diatomite bath mat / coasters to make a drainage layer, it’s too heavy for them to move and is basically like another floor. PLEASE someone tell me if you try this!!!
I think overtime they’d still shred it to where it wouldn’t work anymore 🤔
So you said that you had success with your harvest mice, what are those there in this video, fancy? And why does it work for harvest mice?
I tried it once. My boy got a respiratory infection from the dirt itself. It didnt smell like ammonia or anything, but never again
oh my god! Where did you get that organizer under your cage in the intro!
❤
I heard that small groups of mice can't go in really big cages, even with clutter. Is this true?
No, it’s a myth spread by people who benefit from keeping their mice in tiny setups
Do you use any protectant on the wooden items you put in the mouse enclosures (bioactive or regular)? I'm trying to figure out if theres something I can do to increase the longevity of these items since eventually they get peed on too much.
Yes I used to use plastikote but now just use yacht varnish on all wooden items :)
You can also do a vinegar soak and let it dry in sunlight, often to remove scent. I had a bioactive set up for rats, which worked really well, cut smell and time for me.
How much warms did you have in your soil. ?
I noticed you used top soil as the base. In researching this for rats we are planning to get, everything suggested using coco peat which is soiless, and stays better aerated. I haven't seen anything recommending actual dirt. Do you think this could have contributed to the issues?
I used coco soil and top soil. Coco soil by itself usually isn’t that great when creating a bioactive for a lot of animals as it’s not good for plant growth, for animals not having plants it matters less but I believe it’s still not as good for harbouring beneficial bacteria etc
I have a question how do you keep your mice nails short
How do you bathe a mouse? I've heard they're good swimmers but that doesn't mean they like it. Maybe sand baths? Help please.
You don’t, neither wafer or sand baths are good or safe for mice 🙂
Would you recommend an acrylic and metal tank for mice instead of glass
Oh, I just kind of assumed people were using native insects when I first saw this concept. Or at the very least, insect species that absolutely cannot survive outside. It's actually shocking to me that anyone can just buy insects that could become a major hazard to the environment!? I'm sure there are plenty of people who won't think twice about dumping them outside, regardless what the packaging says... -.-
People have access all the time to feeder insects like mealworms for their reptiles that shouldn’t be released outside but probably do if they get thrown away etc
I just got a mice 3 days ago and it staring to poop green is that noraml??
Which shavings do you recommend for rats?
Sorry for a second comment, but I need to ask you a question. If I am able to get mice, how many do you think could fit in a 32.5”L x 19”W x 17.5”H?
That’s the minimum size for a few mice so around 3, maybe 4 depending on how it’s setup 😊
Tysm!
Do you or friends have houseplants? Maybe you could use the soil for those! Hope you find a solution
Me personally I like bioactive for reptiles but I can’t say for other animals
Hey I have a question! If you are with your mice for at least 2 days a week, and every other weekend.. is that enough time? My parents are divorced, so we divided the time with each parent. I can have my dad feed them when I am gone and give them water, but Will I have enough time with them? I want to know before I ask
It should be fine as long as their needs are still being met, most mice aren’t too fussed about being handled every day as long as they have each other for company 😊
@@Emiology omg thank you! I know darn well when my dad isn’t at work he sits around and stuff so he will be able to refill their water and feed them 😊
Hi I might be getting a rat and I’ve been watching your videos and getting all the nessessary things but I have a cage I might be getting I’m not sure if it’s a good size though, it only says it’s a 94 cm four tier cage with two doors. Would it be good for rats ?
One rat shouldn't be kept alone, please what introduction vids
Im finding it hard to find a substrate that doesn't smell of pee.
My new boys pee for England.
Isumu mom has recommended bedmax.
Im thinking mixing that with my clean n cozy ?
I don’t know about bedding but I suggest a mouse safe air purifier ! will make the room smell a lot leas
I'm not keen on bioactive enclosures for rodents, as you mentioned you do need to keep the substrate moist - which can encourage mould and on that, skin/respiratory infections. Failing that, accidentally inhaled/ingested debris can cause respiratory and/or digestive problems such as colon compaction or anal prolapse.
You're brave for trying though!
When you set up a bioactive enclosure, isopods need to be established in their environment before you add other animals (I suggest lizards, geckos and invertebrates which benefit from a slightly moist environment, not rodents.) Before anyone argues about that's how they live in the wild, they don't have a limited space and have lots of other animals maintaining their ecosystem, they have loads of plants to bind the soil so that it's less likely they will ingest or inhale debris when they tunnel. In this case, adding plants is a no - because you mentioned you will constantly be replacing them from being damaged from chewing.
I've come to the conclusion that the people who claim to have a bioactive environment for rodents are either lying, paying out a fortune and creating a lot of waste or may have/get sick animals.
hi i was wondering if you could look into the holy thursday massacre that recently happened in florida, its such an atrocity that i wish more people were talking about
where do you buy your bales of bedding?
A local feed store that sells horse supplies 😊
I would definitely not recommend it.
It needs more depth, different layers of soil, moisture, plants (roots) and bugs to keep it going.
Where did you think all that ammonia was going to go if you don't have live plants? I could have told you this wouldn't work. 😂
Tell that to the people who advise that nitrification using nitrifying bacteria alone is alone to remove the ammonia
What type of plants do you recommend for the ammonia?
Did she explain why she didn’t put plants? How can you attempt to recreate a natural environment without plants??
You can ask me 😊 Mice destroy plants within hours roots and all
@@Emiology uuugh that sucks! I was hoping to build one of those crazy detailed terrariums like people build for their reptiles with real plants and waterfalls and stuff and putting a rat or a couple mice in it 😔
@@its_me-nikki If you want rats you need to have at least two, three is ideal to start off with. Rats are social animals and will get lonely and depressed if they don't have other rats to live with. They can form bonds with humans but nothing can replace living with other rats.
You can make really beautiful natural-looking setups for mice and rats with real wood branches to climb on. There are sellers on etsy who make hammocks with a leafy woodland theme, it's just that real plants wouldn't last long.
🤍
Turns out mice are not reptiles 🤷. Who would of thought (the whole mouse community would've thought).
Yet it apparently works for lots of rat owners and I’m still seeing mouse owners posting in bioactive groups to this day
@@Emiology mice and rats are two different animals, that's why. They are rodents but they are not sister species. That's why you can't have male mice with each other but male rats have to have other friends.
Also to add substrates are not made for mice they can hurt the respiratory system, yes the mice they were selectively breed from can deal with it because they are weather to do so for centuries but fancy mice cannot due to selectively breeding for temperament for hundreds of years.