Mouse Watching - A Play by Play Account

 Currently, I have three mice. Petal, Dandelion, and Junebug. Petal has a dark orange coat; she is fast and shy. Dandelion's fur is off white--a color that might be called warm vanilla or chiffon or white owl if it were on a paint chip. She has a calm disposition and a skeptical squint. Junebug is white with gray splotches across her coat; there is a slight jump to each of her movements. 

Their cage is set up like this: 

It is a glass tank with paper lining the bottom. I use Kaytee Clean & Cozy bedding. On one side is a wooden structure, which I will refer to as the mouse house. Next to the mouse house, there is an empty tissue box with a funky floral pattern. Hanging above a portion of the mouse house is a hanging water bottle. At the center of the cage is a satellite style wheel, a little larger than a standard saucer. Directly opposite the mouse house is a cardboard structure--the sort you might find as packing material for an electronic device--with cardboard tubes stuck around it. I will refer to the cardboard structure as Mt. Cardboard. Taped on the outside of the cage are four paper houses--purely for decorative purposes. Next to Mt. Cardboard, there is a wooden chew stick and a similar stick covered in seeds. The tank has a mesh/screen style lid and has two black straps buckled around it to prevent the cage from opening without human hands.

It is 7:00am. The mice have rearranged, moving one cardboard tube onto their wheel, another into the opening of the tissue box. Junebug stands atop Mt. Cardboard, looking at the mesh lid of their cage. She turns her head one way then the other, then back again. She takes a step to the left, two steps to the right. She jumps down into Mt. Cardboard. They have chewed through it leaving a large opening near one of the cage walls. She hops back up to her original spot, hops down again, continues looking. She turns her head frantically and moves back and forth with somewhat jerky movements. 

There is a mound of bedding in front of the mouse house that is pulsating suggesting someone is there, busily rearranging, but not visible right now. Bits of bedding keep getting pushed out from the doors to the mouse house. 

Dandelion emerges and slowly crosses the cage, joining Junebug in the open cavern of Mt. Cardboard. There she washes herself. She finds a seed and hops up to the top of Mt. Cardboard to eat it. When she finishes, she cleans her ears, her nose, her face. Petal emerges from the mouse house, hops on top of the tissue box, then drops back down. Standing on the mouse house, she works at chewing through the print exterior of the tissue box. She tires of this quickly, takes a drink, and then returns to the top of the tissue box. 

Across the cage, Junebug stays in the cavern at Mt. Cardboard, occasionally lifting a bit of bedding in her mouth, looking around, and then dropping it again. Dandelion has taken shelter in Mt. Cardboard, peers out towards Petal, then returns to her hiding spot. 

Petal sniffs the air. Dandelion pushes bedding out of Mt. Cardboard. She takes a piece in her mouth, crosses the cage, and drops it at one of the cardboard tubes. Petal jumps down from the tissue box, crosses over to Mt. Cardboard, and stands atop it, eating a seed. 

Dandelion approaches the tissue box, digs at its base, pulls out a seed, eats it, then returns to digging. There is about an inch between the bottom of the tissue box and the bottom of the cage. She slips between the two, pulls out a bit of bedding, places it behind her and returns to the narrow cave beneath the tissue box. Petal, curious, approaches and watches Dandelion work. Dandelion digs more bedding out from beneath the tissue box, crawls down, finds bits of bedding, brings them out. When she finally emerges, Petal takes her place, slipping beneath the tissue box. 

Dandelion leaves, stands on the mouse house, takes a long and noisy drink of water. 

Junebug crosses over, watches Dandelion drink water. She moves past her, enters the tissue box, and stands above Petal as Petal crawls beneath the box, returns, crawls beneath the box, returns...Junebug pulls seeds from the mound of bedding the others have taken from beneath the tissue box. She eats them while sitting in the opening of the box.

Petal leaves, enters the tissue box, and sounds of tearing paper fill the room suggesting her latest activity. Junebug moves to the space Petal had just been, right in front of the tissue box. She digs through the mound of bedding the others excavated, searching for more seeds.

Dandelion emerges from the mouse house, crawls atop the tissue box. Junebug joins her there. Dandelion drops down in front of the tissue box and Petal sticks her head out, sniffing at her sister. Junebug jumps from the top of the tissue box onto the heads of the others, then runs off. Petal returns inside the tissue box, continues her work of tearing. Dandelion crawls under and out from under the tissue box. Junebug joins Petal in the tissue box. After a minute, she sticks her head out, looks around, and pulls it back in. 

Soon, Junebug exits the tissue box, goes to take a drink of water, and climbs on top of the tissue box to chew at the exterior of the box. Petal has chewed a small hole in one corner of the box. Her nose is visible from the very small window. Junebug looks down at it and then runs inside the tissue box with her sister. 

Petal continues her work. Junebug looks out the tissue box, then takes over Petal's work. Petal exits the tissue box, climbs through a cardboard tube, and retreats inside Mt. Cardboard. Shortly after Petal leaves, Junebug sticks her head out of the tissue box, looks around, and then exits. She goes into the mouse house. She returns to the top of the tissue box. She jumps down and enters the tissue box. The tearing sounds resume. 

Across the cage, Mt. Cardboard lifts and drops. Then, Petal emerges, crosses through a cardboard tube, and approaches the mouse house. She picks up a piece of bedding, disposes of it on the roof of the mouse house, and then walks to the top of the tissue box to wash herself. 

I stop watching for five minutes, and when I look back up the cage has gone quiet. Then, Junebug sticks her face up from the cavern at Mt. Cardboard. The whole structure moves up and down. Dandelion emerges from the tissue box. Petal exits from one side of Mt. Cardboard and enters at the other side. Mt. Cardboard pulses. I know they have all united there, inside and out of sight. 

It's 7:45am.