[yyoung]

Anyone able to help me here.... This poor mouse lives alone and a couple of days ago he just overnight became scabby and crusty. I have been putting an antifungal cream and a healing cream on him daily but it's getting worse. I have another mouse (female) who lives in with 5 other females who I've had skin problems with for months who is also getting much worse. Interestingly they are mother and son and so obviously share some genes. The other females in the tank with the mother show no symptoms at all.... but the others are all hairy mice and these two are fuzzys.

Any clues ? Any help gratefully accepted.

 

[Maplewood Stud]

oh poor little bugger, it looks very sore
i dont know what would of caused this (only obvious i can think of its mites) but if both mother and son have it, it may very well be a faulty gene. i know a few people have had problems with hairless and fuzzy mice so hopefully they can give u more ideas,
also what healing cream are u using - u could use either savlon or some tea tree oil/cream to try and heal some of it up, i think id also be tempted to put some germilene cream on it to stop it getting infected or spreading x

edited for spelling

 

[moustress]

It hurts just to look at it. I've had mice with skin problems, but nothing as severe as this, but then, I'd have probably handled this differently than you have.

 

[yyoung]

How would you have handled it then ? .... I'm not proud...I will try anything to help.

It actually doesn't seem to be bothering him and he is perfectly happy for me to put cream on him so I think maybe (and this is just a maybe as I cannot know) it looks worse than it is (thats what I am hoping).

Going to vets with these 2 today anyway so hopefully (with a lot of luck!) they may know what the problem is

 

[julieszoo]

It does look like fungal. I had a cavy get a persistent fungal infection this year, and I bathed him in Nizoral shampoo a couple of times after neither canestan or beaphars anti fungal spray seemed to do much to help. He is now fully recovered. Not sure how stressful it would be to bath a mouse though.

 

[moustress]

Bathing a mouse cuold be done, but one would have to be very careful. A sponge bath in a very warm room (75-78F) and allowed to dry, wrapped in something absorbent, until no longer even a bit damp. I hope something is done for the poor dear soon.

 

[Jack Garcia]

This could also be a food or protein allergy. I know a woman whose mice developed this (it is hereditary) and the only way to cure it is to feed a mouse only one food (such as rice) then very, very slowly introduce new foods until you figure out which ones are causing the inflamed skin, scabs, and open wounds. Bring up this possibility to the vet. It's often not something that first comes to mind, but it's certainly a possible scenario.

 

[x.novabelle.x]

It looks very painful I hope he gets better soon, though from what you've said he doesn't appear to be in too much pain. Like you said, there is a good possibility it looks worse than it is, and hopefully the vet will have some answers. Fingers crossed it's nothing too serious - he looks like a very sweet boy.