What Wheel Is Best?

[Aiko]

Hi!

What wheel is your personal favorite, or do you consider best? Flying Saucer? Or upright wheel? And what are your favorite brands?

If your mouse/mice use upright wheels what position should their tail be in? I'm going to assume that it's bad if it's very bent, along with their backs as well? Someone please correct me if I'm wrong!

Thanks for your replies!

[homesweethammyhome]

To answer I'll give you a breakdown of the wheels we use for our mouse rescues and why we like them.

Our baby mice started out with the medium sized flying saucers, the light blue ones sold at Petco, and have recently been upgraded to the larger red ones because they have doubled in size and weight. Flying saucer pros are they allow any size mouse to run comfortably and hold their tails in whichever position they choose. People comment and DM on our Instagram page almost irate because I've given 4 month old mice huge saucer wheels however they LOVE them and spin just fine! They run all night. Each baby boy has their own, so that is currently 6 separate bincages with 6 large red saucer wheels and there are zero problems with any of them; completely quiet and easy to clean. The girl mice have one in their Ikea Detolf too.

Another of our rescued mice, a boy who is almost 6 months old has a 12 inch wheel from Exotic Nutrtion, the orange one with the holes. This wheel works perfect for him because he is longer in length. I use the 9 inch version of that same brand for my smaller little mouse who isn't able to be adopted out due to illness and it works perfect for him too. These 2 wheels are a little harder to clean but not bad once you develop a routine. Both are 100 percent silent.

Next I have a 10 inch Carolina storm wheel for another rescue and this wheel works well for him. He didn't care for the largest saucer wheel but I'm not sure why. I think he prefers upright. This particular mouse has a 12 inch wheel from Exotic Nutrtion as well and we rotate between the two. We also have a Carolina Storm wheel for the female cage and they absolutely love it! These wheels are excellent for mice and hamsters and I have ordered several however when I tried them out on the baby boys, they slid off alot which is why they were given saucers.

I prefer wheels that allow the mouse to run straight and hold their tails straight as well. Obviously since I have soooooo many here, silent wheels area huge plus!

[Flora]

I personally prefer upright as they take up less room in the cage but flying saucers work well too. I used the 11" wodent wheel which worked great. I can't remember if the tail curved but I don't think it did. My gerbils use the same one now and even the bigger ones tail fits almost perfectly straight. I would also say that any wire wheels are unsuitable not due to sore feet but because most of them have a bar across both side which they can get caught in. also many feet or tails can get stuck and broken in the wire.