hopper mouse cold?

Question
i woke up this morning and i realized my hopper mouse was sneezing a lot, she was sneezing several times with in a minute, so i thought it was a cold and i put her in a different cage which has paper bedding in it, her original one has wood bedding in it and i thought she might be sneezing because of that but she is still doing it and im wondering if she has a cold and if so then what should i do, because i dont have the money to take her to the vet.

Answer
Hi Sara,

It does in fact sound like your hopper has a bit of a cold, or as it's called in the critter world, an upper respiratory infection.  You can provide extra bedding to keep her warm (kudos on switching, she probably really appreciated the snugglier paper bedding), since sick mice get chilled much easier.  She could probably benefit from a round of antibiotics (14-30 days), which is a lot easier and less expensive than it sounds.

Natasha has great instructions for how to administer tetracycline, which is an inexpensive antibiotic you can find in the fish section or at a feed store, here:  http://en.allexperts.com/q/Mice-3824/2009/4/mouse-injured-cat-antibiotic.htm  I don't know if it mentions it in the instructions, but tetracycline breaks down in light, so you'll need to cover the bottle with foil to keep it active.

It was a good idea to separate them, because depending on what caused the symptoms respiratory infections can be contagious to other mice.  If there is a way to keep her in another room until she's healthy again, it would be best, just in case.  If it was in fact an allergy to the bedding, it might still take a while for symptoms to fade, so using paper bedding for the next few weeks simultaneously with the antibiotics should take care of it one way or another.  :)

Hope she feels better soon!
-Tam