"Every Cat Needs a Pet!"

Cheeto and his pet mouse Squeakers

“NOTE FOR THE VISUALLY IMPAIRED: This story is also available as an audio recording, read by Kat, the author.

“Every cat needs a Pet!” That’s what my cat Cheeto said to me, subliminally of course. This happened the same day that I flushed his dearly departed “pet” betta fish, Sushi, down the toilet. Cheeto was in mourning. He had loved that fish. He was fascinated just watching the brilliant blue, flamboyant Cirque du Soleil-like fish that swished and then swooshed around in eloquent circles inside his aquarium. His large, fan-like tail and red-tipped fins shimmered under the aquarium light that cast light from above.

Prior to his death, Sushi was a fish with an important job: to keep my flubber-bellied-ginger-juvenile-delinquent-nuisance-cat named Cheeto out of trouble so that I could work without interruptions on the memoir that I was writing.

Blue betta fish - this is close to what Sushi looked like (Photo Credit: depositphotos - Ondrej Svoboda)

“I need a pet. In fact, every cat needs a pet,” Cheeto seemed to say to me as he stared at the now empty fish tank. It was a 10-gallon tank, an ocean really for Sushi since I “rescued” him. Technically, I freed this beautiful betta from living in the small glass bottle that the pet store had kept him in. Within his 10-gallon tank, Sushi enjoyed plenty of room, interesting statues to swim in and around, and fresh seaweed to swim around. He was living the betta dream!

But now, the tank sat empty, the light and the motor of the filter were turned off, and there was no movement, no sound, and no Sushi—only very dark and very still water. Cheeto knew something was not right. He just laid there for hours, giving me an occasional stare but mostly he laid with his back facing me in protest, staring endlessly at the tank. I was trying to decide if I wanted to rescue another betta fish or if I should try something new.

Cheeto was not alone in mourning the death of his beloved fish. My other cat, Myron, a gray tabby, had also enjoyed watching Sushi swim in the aquarium. But once there was no fish in the tank, Myron was sensible and moved on to more important business (i.e. catnaps). It was Cheeto who pouted about not having a pet to entertain himself, Myron couldn’t care less.

Myron, the naturally SKINNY cat consoles Cheeto the BLIMP during one of their naps after the passing of Sushi. (photo credit: Author Kat Albrecht)

At the time, I had a friend who owned a pet snake that she fed mice. Live mice. Not long after losing Sushi and while at this friend’s apartment, I noticed that she had two of the cutest little white mice in a small cage. I knew their fate (snake food) and I just couldn’t stand it!

“I’m going to take one of these mice home with me,” I told her, not asking permission, but telling her. “Which one doesn’t bite?”

She handed me one of the mice and I was amazed at how sweet it was! I previously had hamsters in my teens so I wasn’t opposed to adopting a pet mouse for Cheeto. I placed it inside a small cardboard box and headed straight to my local corporate pet store.

I already owned the aquarium that the mouse would live inside, so I pulled out my debit card and spent a chunk of change. I bought sawdust for bedding, a mouse food dish, mouse food, a water bottle, strawberry yogurt treats (I later taught the mouse to “beg” for these!), an exercise wheel, a plastic exercise ball (meant for hamsters to roll around the floor), a small plastic hidey home for the mouse to crawl into at night, and a metal screen that fit perfectly on the top of my 10-gallon aquarium and prevented cats from crawling down inside! I was all in as a new mouse guardian, and so was Cheeto! And Myron, too.

I named the mouse Squeakers and after I got home from draining my bank account on mouse supplies, I set up the aquarium and then introduced the mouse to both cats. They loved him! I mean, THEY LOVED SQUEAKERS! They spent endless hours, almost to the point of missing meals. Myron probably actually did miss a meal, but not Cheeto—that was where he drew the line! They sat riveted in front of that aquarium as the white rodent moved around and checked out his new digs. I set the aquarium on the living room floor and those cats were mesmerized, staring at it like two kids addicted to Mindcraft!

Cheeto loved how Squeakers smelled, but never once tried to see how he tasted! (Photo credit: Author Kat Albrecht)

Cheeto and his pet mouse Squeakers (Photo Credit: Author Kat Albrecht)

Weeks turned into months and my cats spent endless hours in front of that aquarium. As indoor-only cats, I was more than happy to provide them with the entertainment that would keep them focused, entertained, and especially out of trouble. Cheeto was coming out of his teen years where he was always getting into trouble. As a young kitten, if he wasn’t racing down the hallway at 4:00 a.m. just to bang against the kitchen cupboards (to wake me up so I could feed him, of course), Cheeto was climbing our curtains, chewing on any box that had packing tape on it, or worming his way into my closet and SHREDDING the wedding dress that I never wore (I gave the ring back—long story for another day).

According to Google, the average lifespan for a domestic white mouse is 18 months to 2 years. However, it says that, “with proper care and attention, some white mice have been known to live for 3 years.” I did not share these statistics with Cheeto, but just a year after bringing Squeakers home, I found him in decline early one morning as I was getting dressed. He had stopped eating two days before this and was not even interested in his yogurt treats. He stopped drinking. Now he was a quivering, suffering little mouse.

I felt bad leaving him in that condition, but I had a speaking engagement to get to. Hours later when I got home, Squeakers was worse. I drove him straight to my veterinarian and paid $40.00 to euthanize him. I knew it was the kindest thing that I could do for Cheeto’s beloved friend. On my way home, I stopped off at my friend’s house and stole another mouse. I just couldn’t stand the thought of going home to an empty aquarium and a grieving cat.

This time, I picked a brown mouse. I took him home and picked him up and he immediately bit me! From that point on, I was hesitant to pick him up and just let him enjoy his life inside of Squeaker’s old aquarium. When I brought the aquarium out, I set it on the floor and immediately both cats realized something was different. Squeakers had changed colors from white to brown! This fascinated Cheeto and Myron.

I had to figure out a new name for this mouse. I will never forget the silhouette of Fat Cheeto sitting next to Skinny Myron staring at the brown mouse. It was like I could HEAR what they were saying to each other and it went something like this:

MYRON: “Do you like dark meat, too?”

CHEETO: “Oh yes!”

MYRON: “What do you think he tastes like?”

CHEETO: “Um…like chicken!”

So that became the new mouse’s name: Chicken. He lived for almost a year. Once he passed away, I weaned the cats off of the aquarium. But their fascination with watching mice helped me to discover that mouse-watching for cats was an excellent way of training “target cats” to crate quietly! Both Cheeto and Myron were employed (by me) as target cats—cats that were trained to silently lay in their crates as the Cat Detection Dogs that I trained found the crate hidden in the bushes at a local park. If you want to see Cheeto in action as a target cat, watch this video here:

Here are two videos of a crated cat named Martha that we “tested” using a mouse. In the first video, Martha was crated and left alone for 4 minutes and 34 very long seconds. During that time, you can count 36 very distressed meows (that only started when she was left alone). This poor kitty became near frantic and must suffer from separation anxiety! If we had known that Martha was going to be this frantic, we would never have left her alone like this!

Next, the volunteer brought in a plastic carrier with two mice inside of it and set it in front of Martha. As you can see in the video below, during the second test she STOPPED meowing and was fixated on the mice until near the end of the test. Martha failed the testing to become a target cat because she clearly did NOT enjoy being left alone in a crate. She probably would never enjoy the work and we want cats to be happy in their employment!

For all my cat lovers out there, we’ve adapted this training method to using small plastic containers where we cover them with one-way mirror “film” used to provide privacy on windows. We use it so that the cat see the mouse, but the mouse can only see his own reflection in the mirrored film wrapped around his plastic cage. We want to entertain the cat but not panic the mouse.

The presence of mice placed in front of crated cats demonstrates what a calming / distracting affect that giving a cat a pet mouse can be!

CHEETO WAS RIGHT!

I no longer have Cheeto and Myron. I no longer have all of my Pet Tracking dogs. But what I do have is plenty of memories, great stories, and a willingness to park my butt here and tell you about the quirky journey that I’ve been on for the past 30 years.

IF YOU LIKED THIS STORY, WOULD YOU PLEASE CONSIDER ADDING K9 PET TRACKERS TO YOUR “RECOMMENDATIONS” AND RESTACKING THIS POST?