The Tiniest Mouse meets mrs Too

I am going to tell you the story of a little mouse that lives under the seat in our garden.

It is not an ordinary seat but a row of garden slabs propped on a small wall of bricks and then against the house extension. It ended just before the kitchen door on the right and where the bricks met the wall there was the tiniest of holes and this is where Mrs M lived with her husband and babies.

I often sit with a cup of tea and a piece of homemade chocolate cake behind the French sliding doors of the kitchen. When I have a piece of cake I always put a scrap out for the mice and they would come out of their tiny hole, scamper alongside the wall and, using their paws, check to see if they could pick it up, then grab it with their teeth and take it back along the wall to their unusual home.

My husband grows vegetables so other times I might put out some freshly picked beans or peas.

I love the animals in my garden and regular put out food for them and the birds that fly over whether they be the tiniest of wrens or robins, crows or magpies, and recently I started to put out special food to entice birds of prey and owls. This may sound unusual I know, but I was also hoping it would stop the prey birds and owls from eating the mice.

But I digress and this is the story about the smallest mouse I have ever seen.

One day I had set up a camera as I was going out and as the weather was nice I thought that something exciting might happen in the garden while I was out and did not want to miss it.

When I got back I loaded the video onto my computer and my husband and I sat and watched it and this is what we saw.

The sun was shining and a small nose peeked out of the tiny hole.

It was followed by Mrs M and one of her baby’s.

He looked up into his mothers eyes.

They were soft and brown under her long lashes as she looked down at him with all the loving care a mother can muster. He watched as she turned her head, sniffed the air and, as her whiskers twitched, he knew it was time to step out into the big wide world.

For a house mouse he was rather small, smaller than his brothers and sisters when they had left the safety of the nest 3 days ago. There were five babies this time, 3 brothers and 1 sister and of course he made 5.

He sniffed the air as his mother had done and slowly eased his body out through the tiny hole in the brickwork of the house. His home, until now, had consisted of a long run from the nest to the exit where he had played in safety with his siblings. It was surrounded by brickwork both sides and large slabs on top which meant he had never seen the sun.

Mrs M kept sniffing the air as the pair slowly crept out into the warm sunshine.

Picking up confidence the tiny mouse followed her.

He gazed up at the sky where clouds were scudding along in the high breeze; he had never seen anything move so fast!

He looked across and saw a big box on legs with earth and green stuff in. His mother was watching him and saw where he was looking.

‘That’s the old lady’s little vegetable garden’ she told him. ‘We are going down to the big garden though were the bird table is and there are lots of seeds. We might be able to go to the old man’s garden too where he grows lots of things and take some peas or carrots with us too. It will mean lots of journeys.’

‘Won’t the old man be cross with us for taking his food?’ asked the tiny mouse.

‘Not if we do not spoil anything and only take what we need.’ She replied

They crept along the edge of the brick bench until they reached the end. Then very quickly and carefully they scampered across to the edge of the raised pond.

The old man had left the hose pipe leaning over the edge of the pond so Mrs Mouse climbed up very carefully followed by her tentative son.

At the top were tubs of earth with tomato plants in but that is not what the tiny mouse saw. He was on the edge of the wall and looked down into the pond and saw monsters!

‘Mum!’ He squeaked, ‘there are monsters in the water!’

‘Sshhhh’ she replied’ don’t let them hear you call them that. They are fish. They will not hurt you. Sometimes when the old man feeds them he drops their food on the ground and Mr Crow comes down to eat it. He helps to keep the garden tidy for the old man and woman.’

They continued their exploration of the wall to see if they could reach the tomatoes watched by the fish below who were most intrigued by their visitors.

At last they went to the end of the wall where they climbed down some ivy which had been growing over the winter and so far missed by the old man.

The tiny mouse had to stop. He was puffed out! All this exercise on his first day out was getting to him.

Mrs M continued to scamper across the lawn to the base of a very tiny ladder that reached up to the top of the bird table that the old couple had put there.

The tiny mouse did not see where his mother went and when he looked up from his rest he was unable to see her anywhere. So keeping to the edge of the lawn, he ran off.

In the distance he could see a large glass building so when he got to the corner where the lawn met this building he turned right and scampered along until the building ended and he had to turn left.

He could not see his mother anywhere. He had been calling out to her but there had been no reply.

He wasn’t too scared as his mother had told him that the old couple in the house looked after the animals who lived or visited the garden but that did not stop him from wondering where his mother was, or where he was for that matter!

There was an old branch across his pathway so instead of going around it he thought would climb up it and see if he could spothis mother from the top.

He went up and up, further and further until another branch crossed over, this one led up into an old pear tree that was at the bottom of the garden.

He continued to climb until eventually he was very very high above the ground and when he looked down he felt scared for the first time.

He turned around slowly to face the garden and from his vantage point could see everything. The old shed, the greenhouse, the incinerator from where he had smelled the smoke when the old lady was burning her rubbish.

The two compost bins that his mother had told him to stay away from because of the ants.

Standing on his hind legs and sniffing the air he finally saw the two bird tables and there was his mother on one picking up seeds and throwing them down to the floor.

As he continued to look at his world, he noticed a funny noise, like a squeak and occasionally a hiss.

Looking into the tree he saw a wooden box and decided he would explore it to see if the noise belonged to someone he knew.

Creeping slowly he went deeper into the tree until he was close enough to see the hole in the wooden box.

He climbed up using the tree and the perch outside the hole, on which he stood to peer in.

It was very dark inside and there were unfamiliar smells, also the noises got louder and there was more hissing. His curiosity getting the better of him he stepped onto the entrance of the box.

Suddenly everything went really dark and a soft kind voice behind him said ‘I wouldn’t go in there love, they might eat you.’

The tiny mouse turned around and came face to face with a bird; she had a lovely feathery white face and looked really kind.

‘Who are you? What are you’ How do you know they will eat me?’ asked the tiny mouse in a rush.

The bird looked at him and in her gentle voice replied ‘Well, first I am their mother and the old lady calls me Mrs Too, I am a barn owl and normally we eat mice but the old lady puts out special food for us and has asked us to leave you alone, but I have not taught that yet to my children, which is why they might eat you.’

The tiny mouse started to quiver and would have backed away from the beautiful Mrs Too if he had somewhere to go.

‘What are you doing up here? You are so tiny should you have even left the nest yet?’ asked Mrs Too

‘I got lost’ replied the tiny mouse and told her the story of his first day out in the big garden.

Mrs Too looked towards the bird tables and saw that Mrs M must have been missing her son as she was running from corner to corner on the bird table and look over the edges and calling for the tiny mouse in a very high squeak.

‘Come on’ said Mrs Too ‘It looks like your mother is very worried about you, I will hold you gently in my claws and take you back to her.’

The tiny mouse was a bit worried about that but Mrs Too was so gentle as she silently took off with him in her claws that he soon relaxed.

Mrs Too glided silently towards the table and at that point Mrs M looked up and saw her baby as Mrs Too gently dropped him on the table.

‘Oh thank you Mrs Too, thank you so much for bringing him back to me I was quite worried.’ She squeaked.

‘My pleasure Mrs M, I don’t think he will wander off again anytime soon.’

With a wave of her wing Mrs Too flew off.

‘Come on Pipsqueak, let’s get the seeds and get back to the nest and see what the others have gathered for tea.’

With that Mrs M and the tiny mouse ran back down the ladder, picked up the seeds and, keeping close to the wall, ran alongside the brick bench until they got back to their tiny nest inside.

And I promise you it is all true. I have the video to prove it.