In general, give them things to destroy and build with. Rodents of all sorts LOVE to build, re-arrange, and deconstruct their nests. So give them things they can take apart & re-assemble. Toilet paper tubes, cotton stuffed pillows, things of that nature.
Yes, introducing new foods slowly will enrich them but most rodents love to focus on their nests. So give them interesting things to build with.
No wheel because they have so much enrichment one wonât fit! !! But Iâve been looking at some âshallow wheelsâ on Amazon and may try them. These old men have never been on a wheel. Iâve included a bunch of climbing things and weâll see how much they want to exercise. I can always rearrange things or swap out it they seem to like exercise.\
I will swap out enrichment.
Thanks!
They will have standard rodent nest material for a long time. They come compact but it is up to the mice to spread it around. That is also a great indicator of mouse health. I provided two places where they can nest away from light or not. They can have multiple nesting areas if they want. I suspect theyâll choose over time. Not only will they get a nestlet (bed-râNest), theyâll sometimes get a cardboard hut that theyâre can chew on and/or a heavy duty cardboard âToilet Rollâ that they can make nests with (https://www.bio-services.nl/product-en/cage-enrichment). Theyâll have alternative plastic âhutsâ for nests. They have lots of enrichment in their futures!
You mean like this?
(I love this image and have used it several times!)
A tiny furry creature might definitely help them feel like they are being social. Even a blob that they can nest with. Thank you. Any ideas, everyone? I donât have anything similar. A knotted sock?
I raised fancy mice for several years, theyâre fun pets!
The saucer wheels are great. Much less risk of injury than the traditional wheels. And they take up less space. Highly recommend!
Thanks!!
Oh, and for this oneâknotted scraps of fleece. Nothing with strings or thread 
OOoo, Iâll have to search for this. Thanks!
I had some trimmed pieces of natural wool fleece (scraps from horse halter and girth fleece covers that I happened to have) that I put in Pippin and Merryâs habitats. When they were babies they each snuggled/huddled up against their fleece pieces. The pieces were big enough that I could fold them so they had a bit of solidity. Eventually, the pieces wore out/could no longer be laundered, and I havenât gotten new pieces yet.
Google âwodent wheelâ
Itâs a special wheel for squirrels to run on with their tails. Mice and rats might like it too
Love this thread! I have a pet barn mouse that I ârescuedâ and couldnât release, so have been trying to enrich itâs life by swapping out toys. Great ideas here, and love the heart of folks for all creatures great and small:)
I was talking about fleece like polarfleece, but yeah, I bet theyâd love real wool fleece too! Iâd just watch for fibers working loose, they could wrap around wee little toes or get ingested.
@J-Lu little cat bell toys are another big hit. Like these:
https://www.petco.com/shop/en/petcostore/product/leaps-and-bounds-lattice-ball-cat-toys
Neither of these guys chewed the fleece, but we definitely monitored for that. House mice in my tack room have definitely chewed on wool fleece there at times, but for some reason these two did not. These two seem to like to chew wood more than softer stuff. They donât even really chew up the paper bedding though they do move it around and pack it in their nest areas. Their behaviors are a bit different than wild (or domesticated) house mice or the lab mice Iâve known --they jump a lot both vertically and horizontally, for instance.
Iâm really looking forward to updates on J-Luâs retired lab mice! 
Those look like our local deer mice who are adorable but big pests. They can jump crazy heights like if they fall in a bucket they keep jumping vertically until you let them loose out back where the owl livesâŠ
When we were kids my sister and I had an assortment of dwarf hamsters and one cute white mouse. They were all very friendly and liked to be handled. We had a bunch of playmobile horse jumps and different obstacles for them to climb over, under, and through. So we would make a âtrackâ for them to go around. Theyâre very fast, and learned very quickly that they would get a little treat when they got to the other end.
The Deer Mice (Peromyscus maniculatus) and White Footed (Peromyscus leucopus) mice are closely related species.
Both are common in my area. I havenât definitively identified which species these two are. Colloquially,people use the two common names interchangeably.
They are too cute to kill. They have huge eyes and ears and long tails. Weâve been overtaken by rats most recently and I think the deer mice have been run out.
I deep bed and maresy mostly poops in her runout so I just let her bedding sit for weeks or months. Last summer I found a nest of pinkie stage something in my actual stall bedding. I just left them. Several weeks later I had to finally strip my stall for power washing and was dreading what Iâd find but in the same spot I disturbed multiple very tiny but fully formed micelings that ran in different directions.
OMG. You gotta google mouse toys and all kinds of ideas come up. Active games like walk on a plank, real tiny hammocks that swing. Tunnels that wind around the cage. So many cute activities.
Thanks! They have balls like this from the unknown leggo-like set at the barn.
Sounds like âMouse Agility.â
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