When a man arrived at a New Hampshire animal shelter last week claiming he wanted to surrender 150 house mice, the shelter was ready to take them. But the problem soon became much more mousey when he revealed that he had 150 boxes full of mice. mice to surrender, not 150 individual rodents.
The overwhelmed mouse owner initially brought 73 mice last Monday, the New Hampshire Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals said in a Thursday news release. Another 450 were transferred soon after, and staff made trips to his home on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, filling vans with bins of mice.
The shelter said they expect the number of mice to grow to nearly 1,000.
The reason behind this whisker-curling number is the fast reproduction rate of rodents. According to the NHSPCA, the mice were not separated by sex and reproduced uncontrollably. With a gestation period of only about twenty days, mice can reproduce incredibly quickly, and many of the females have already arrived pregnant.
Staff and volunteers care for some of nearly 1,000 beautiful mice held in glass tanks and surrendered to the New Hampshire SPCA in Stratham, NH on November 15, 2024
The NHSPCA also said they previously lived in “dirty plastic tubs that had not been cleaned for a long time”.
They have put out a call to the entire New England area through the New England Federation of Humane Organizations for help transferring some mice from the NHSPCA to make room for the incoming bins, the release said.
“We have never seen anything like this,” Savannah Alcero, director of animal and veterinary services at the NHSPCA, said in the release. “And the longer we wait to get all the mice out of their terrible living conditions, the more likely it is that the numbers will continue to grow.”
These are pet mice, or “nice mice,” the shelter confirmed in the release. They said these mice are highly social, preferring to live in groups and are relatively easy to care for. Most are already available for adoption, with the exception of those who are pregnant or require veterinary care.
Community members are encouraged to help by adopting, fostering or donating to the shelter.
This article was originally published on NBCNews.com
