How do they keep finding so much more to follow up on? [ooooh, ending a sentence not with one but TWO prepostitions!]
Mice and man to part company
By AMY CALDER
Staff Writer Kennebec Journal & Morning Sentinel Friday, March 30, 2007
WATERVILLE -- Bill Exner has decided to give up his pet mice on the advice of wildlife experts who say the rodents could carry deadly diseases and may not legally be kept in captivity.
Exner, 68, trapped the mice over the weekend after they allegedly carted off his lower dentures and hid them in a bedroom wall. He ultimately found the false teeth -- but then decided to buy an aquarium for the mice and keep them as pets.
Exner's battle with the furry filchers of his false teeth became news throughout the country, with a report even appearing on CNN.
But experts say the mice he trapped shouldn't be kept as pets.
"If it's living in a house in Maine -- most of them are deer mice or white-footed mice," said Karen Morris, a wildlife biologist with the state Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife. "The little buggers are everywhere."
The mice Exner captured are deer mice (Peromyscus maniculatis), a native species of wildlife known to be the main carrier of Hantavirus pulmonary syndrome, according to Jim Nelson, a professor of wildlife studies at Unity College.
Hantavirus is a rare and potentially deadly disease spread by rodents, according to the Centers for Disease Control.
Humans can contract the disease when they come into contact with infected rodents or their urine and droppings.
Nelson says that while no known cases of Hantavirus have been detected in Maine, numerous deaths have occurred in other areas of the country.
"The virus is carried in the droppings and urine and dissipates in the air," he said. "Yes, you could get it by breathing the smell of urine and droppings. You can also get it from a bite."
Oakland's animal control officer, Patrick Faucher, a former Waterville animal control officer, plans to release Exner's mice into the wild soon.
"Bill has agreed to release them to me," Faucher said Thursday. "Why take a chance? And he agrees."
Morris says one must be very careful when stirring up areas where mice have been, and where their urine and droppings are.
"It's something you don't want to mess around with," she said. "It's a matter of sanitation. If you do have to clean an area, wet it down and wear gloves and make real certain of sanitation."
Exner says he will miss the mice, as he has become quite attached to them, but he knows releasing them is the right thing to do.
"I got the aquarium. I might just sterilize the aquarium and go get myself some fish and that'll be the end of the story," he said.
Amy Calder -- 861-9247
acalder@centralmaine.com
retrieved 3/31/2007 from http://morningsentinel.mainetoday.com/news/local/3761864.html
