From food pyramids to calorie guides, we have a pretty good idea of what humans need to eat in a day. But what about mice? How much food and water do mice need to survive?
Food
The amount of food needed is going to depend on various factors such as:
- environmental pressure
- external stressors
- reproductive process/activity
- current healthy level
- daily activity and travel levels
- food quality
Mice can handle a much wider variety of type and quality of food than we can as people. They are happy to eat:
- Food left on the counter
- unprepared food in storage (yup! They can smell packaged food)
- discarded food in the trash
- dirty, greasy crumbs that fell out of sight
- pet food
In terms of quantity, a mouse only needs about .13 ounces of food or 161 calories per day to be healthy.
Water
As surprising as it is to us, mice don’t need a direct water source to survive. They are able to get adequate hydration from the food they consume. This doesn’t mean that they won’t take fresh, delicious water when it is available to them, but it is a key point in understanding mice, If they can get their water needs covered from food, additional sources around the home such as condensation on pipes or drippings from a condenser might as well be rushing rivers of survival for a family of mice.
How To Stop Mice
Mice require a multifaceted approach to getting rid of them. Starting with minimizing food available is the key, but it can be very difficult to reduce it enough to knock out a population with that effort alone based on the information above. Minimizing food just limits population expansion and can increase pressure on the existing mice. This will help improve other control efforts. In addition to controlling food source, it is important to remove potential nesting and harborage sites, block of entry points, and work on killing or removing the mice directly.
Call In The Pros
If you are dealing with mice, don’t hesitate to reach out to the professional rodent stoppers at Rove Pest Control. We can give advice and assistance at any point along the way from identification, to location, to getting rid of them and stopping them from returning. Not sure what you need? We can help you figure out where to start.