South Yorkshire Times, Week Ending January 12th 1934
Mousology
A West Melton “Farm”
Interesting Study
It’s not easy to walk upside down on the ceiling. Flies can do it, of course, and a certain young lady of Ealing is supposed to have a flair for that particular form of acrobatics. A mouse can do it. The “wee beasties” can travel upside down as fast as when they are making a “getaway” across the pantry table. This was one of the additions to the natural history knowledge of a reporter who visited a “mouse farm” at West Melton this week.
It belongs to Mr. W. A. Robinson, 28, Oak Lea Avenue. Mr. Robinson has about fifty of these little creatures cosily housed in a hut on his allotment. He took up the “fancy” last year and it has provided him with an interesting hobby. His collection consists of black-eyed and pink-eyed “self-whites,” cute little creatures with bright eyes, pink noses, long tapering pink tails and pelts like white velvet. Our reporter learned another interesting fact, also – that red mice are bred by some fanciers and, of course, are more uncommon than their champagne, sable, chocolate, or tan fellows. There are also Japanese “waltzing” mice who have a habit of chasing their tails. But Mr. Robinson is mostly interested in his little stock of white mice and spends a lot of time caring for them.
A Mouse Nest
The mice are boused in some half dozen boxes, each about two and a half feet long and a foot and a half wide. The doors are placed on the top and a large hole is cut in one side of the box to be covered with perforated zinc. The cages require very careful construction as the little creatures quickly gnaw away any projections and eventually find a way out. Mr. Robinson’s mice apparently think there’s no place like home, for he has never lost one yet – and there are one or two indications in the box sides that those little teeth have been at work. Paraffin oil brushed on the wood helps to prevent it.
Occupying about one-eighth of the floor area of the box is a smaller box lined with dry grass, from which the mice construct a nest in their own ingenious manner. The grass is formed into a little tunnel, and in the space of about twenty square inches four or five of the little creatures can hide away. The floor is strewn with sawdust and a little water pot is all that is required to complete the furnishings. Of course, there are “extras” such as acrobatic wheels, but Mr. Robinson’s mice get quite enough exercise chasing each other round or walking upside down on the wire mesh.
An Interesting Hobby
A white mouse is very handsome, but “what big ears he has got.” All the better to hear when the cat is about. Mr. Robinson’s mice appear to have few cares. They are remarkably tame and will gambol on the cages without ever feeling a desire to go native. If ever they happen to do so, Mr. Robinson can say “Good bye” for in their boxes there is evidence of their ability to hide in small compass. The pink tip of a tail lying about in one corner is all that serves to tell you that “pink eyes” is simply taking a nap.