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A friend contacted me late last night in a state of freaked-out-ness. She's staying at her dad's who has something of a hoarding problem. The cat had caught a mouse and left her a present. My initial reaction was "that's no mouse."
I've never played Guess Who: Rodent Edition but I'm going with "baby rat." Can anyone provide a more authoritative answer please?
Siberian Hamster, surely?
Yeah, that's a rat.
Eeeez a RAT.
Was it in a kitchen?
Bolivian death hamster
Looks like a house mouse. Any chance you could include a scale in the piccy?
Take it to the bike park and leave it by a trail somewhere.
I'm going with wood mouse (with zero authority and limited googling)
I asked for scale. It's been disposed of. It was apparently "larger than a hamster."
Ask them to search for droppings to help with identification
It's Basil.
A rat (can say with relative good authority as I have seen thousands of the little buggers, dead and alive.) It is the thickness of the tail where it joins the body that gives it away. No mice or other rodents have one like that, apart from the Siberian Hamster of course.
Mouse.
I think it's a mouse based on a 2 second google as the tail seems a bit hairy and not scaly, also the ears seem big.<br />I think it the tail just looks thick because whatever it is it's quite small, unless it's lying on a duvet and not a paper towel
Based on what our cat brings in, that's a mouse.
I'm revising my answer based on Welshfarmer's undoubted greater experience. Unless the guy from rentokil rocks up to this thread. I think the larger feet may be a sign that it's a young rat on closer review/googling (its a slow day).
That’s no rat, it’s a mouse.
I recommend she stands on a chair until emergency services can attend.
If it's bigger than a hamster, it's bigger than any mouse.
Rat.
Not that it really matters; they're just different versions of the same thing, an omnivorous rodent who it's better you don't have loose about yer hoose...
It is not a squirrel.
That is the end of my knowledge
Have they compared it to a meerkat?
At least you have the full body for identification. Our cats usually just leave some random innards, and occasionally the head. From that bit of Dexter/CSI evidence we have to do the guessing game of "vole, shrew, mouse, or rat?"
So according to that ^ guide, it's basically impossible to tell if it was a mouse or a young rat.
Did it leave grease marks?
Next time, try to catch it alive and keep it under observation for 24 hours. Count the droppings.
Anyway... my personal method is: mice are small and cute, rats are not either. Plus fat bald tail.
Field mouse. Absolutely zero doubt here.
There’ll be one round here soon enough the way my cat goes. I’ll snap a pic for you.
Field mouse. Absolutely zero doubt here.
I asked for scale. It’s been disposed of. It was apparently “larger than a hamster.”
Biggest field mouse I ever did saw.
Hairy tail - mouse.
If she'd said it was about the size of her thumb, then it's a mouse, at "larger than a hamster" you're well into rat territory.
Ìts not Dangermouse as no eye patch. So probably Penfold.
I love the definitive rat vs. mouse pronouncements!
FWIW, I'd say rat due to tail thickness. I would assume rat tails start off a bit hairy and then they lose the hair.
I'd go with baby rat, having caught about 15 in our garden over the past two months. All released by the canal, a good 5 miles away. Baby rats are pretty easy to catch.
The mother (known as patio rat) mysteriously disappeared after having the second brood.
I think we're fairly rat free at the moment, not seen any for a couple of weeks.
I'm going to say mouse, based only that it looks fairly cute.
In my experience no rat looks cute
Baby ones do!
It's an interesting one to ID because the photo is poor and I'm not used to IDing from the underside. I'm inclined to say field mouse. The snout is quite pointy, the ear looks large (although folded), the eye also looks big/bulging (although semi closed), the tail does not look that thick compared to the foot (and I think the camera is distorting things quite a bit), it doesn't look that big overall compared to the dots on the kitchen roll and the sandy/ginger colour is more mouse than rat.<br /><br /> I vote field mouse (different to house mouse).
Wincantons greater frilled jungle gerbil. The last of it’s kind. Murderer
Given the absolute certainty of conflicting answers above, I'm going to suggest it is either a Rouse or a Mat.
(assuming of course we have discounted baby robin?)
is cute is maus
All released by the canal, a good 5 miles away. <br /><br />
I’m pretty sure this is illegal, same with grey squirrels.
is either a Rouse
A rodent of unusual size? I don't think they exist.
Oooo. Puts another perspective on it. Tis a pretty long tail to be fair
Have you still got it?<br /><br />Can you pick it up and wipe it on the walls to see if it leaves grease marks?
All released by the canal, a good 5 miles away.
I’m pretty sure this is illegal, same with grey squirrels.
It is. And apparently condemns them anyway cos they can't establish a nest and find food or avoid predators
Still got no sense of scale in those pics tho. Funny coloured rat tho.
two pages, we are all beyond help.
Legal to release brown rats. Illegal to release squirrels. You're right that most will die anyway, but they have some chance of survival where we put them.
That's a lot of ratchets left lying about every day according to the guide, do folk from Northern England still stick them down their trousers as a pub sport/pastime along with gurning ?
sorry - old links broken - have deleted and will repost
Moot point on the release of brown rats or normal mice. Technically OK to release but illegal to cause suffering and putting them into a new area where they will have no knowledge of areas, possibly established populations, competing for food *might* be considered as causing suffering.
Read that as FACT and then seems you can release, but only into the environment they're already in. Which begs the question, why trap it to then release it back into your own garden!
Dat fing is rat.
Huh. I always thought field mice were smaller than house mice (hice mice?). Google has edjukated me.
Anyway, I still vote for rat. Either that or it is a squirrel after all, with a shaved tail.
Still got no sense of scale in those pics
+1
Some scale please. Can you put it on your hand, or next to the cat or something?
Shame there’s nothing for scale, that would make it easy to identify. It could be a young rat, but it could also be an adult mouse. I had a rat living under my shed for a while, a few years back, we’d be sitting out on the patio, and there’d be a little nose and whiskers poke out, then it would shoot out and grab a suet pellet the birds had dropped and shoot back under again, taking about five seconds. <br />It disappeared after a while, it either died from natural causes, or one of the neighbourhood cats got it. Never seen another one around since.
Unless that yellow thing is a waste bin, I’d be inclined to say house mouse.
I’ve been hesitating to post cos I’m gonna start sounding shouty, but I’m not I promise 😂
If it’s a rat then it’s got the biggest head a rat has ever had relative to its body. The pictures do make scale tricky
If it’s a rat it’s got the most beautiful, almost field mouse like colouration I’ve ever seen… they’re called brown rats for a reason.
If it’s a rat it’s got the smoothest, hairiest tail I’ve ever seen on a rat.
If it’s a rat that’s the biggest ****ing piece of kitchen roll in the world.
If it’s a house mouse its ears are way too small.
It’s a field mouse. And OPs friend has overreacted on the size description. Fair enough. Some big girl mice out there that can give quite the shock. But it ain’t a rat.
And probably useful info to add: distinction between field mouse and house mouse is important.
House mouse bloody loves living in your cavity walls, ceiling/floor voids, eating your food in the cupboard. When caught needs ferrying a long way from home before release. They’re the ones that have developed that reputation for being problematic.
Field mouse is more like wtf is this indoor place about get me out of here! Catch in a humane trap and just let em get on with it in the field.
The comparison to hamster size is possibly misleading. Hamsters are little round fat things. Mice are long thin things especially with the tail. In what sense is it bigger than a hamster, and how big was the hamster anyway? I don’t know a lot about hamsters but we had one once and it seemed pretty titchy.
We’ve had plenty of mice and rats (both tame, and wild in the garden) and I’ve never found it hard to tell apart.
Here’s my/our little guest out for a snack… 😁
PLOT TWIST!
The cat's caught another. But buggered off with it.
Just asked my cat and she says it’s definitely an eagle. She wouldn’t lie because she can’t talk and doesn’t actually exist. Hope that helps Cougar?
Plot twist #2. I caught 2 with the exact same colouration in our loft last night. They were definitely nice.
And we slept a lot better without the scratching and gnawing.
Based on second set of pics I'm swapping from Team Rat to Team Mouse.