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[LittlePony]

Hello there,

We live in a ground floor flat and have recently discovered that we have mice. We have completely cut off their food supply, making sure they have no access to even crumbs on the floor, and we have started to block off where they are coming in. We are setting humane traps tomorrow so hopefully they work and the problem will be solved ASAP. However, last night I'm pretty certain there was a mouse or mice stealing food and bedding from the bars of our chinchillas cages. Could they have passed on any kind of infection to our chins? Would chinchillas usually scare mice away? Has anyone had a similar experience? 

Any advice you could give me would be much appreciated.

Thanks!

[GrayRodent]

I think the risk of the chinchilla actually catching something is very low although the potential is there. The worst risks come from biting parasites but chinchillas are resistant to those. I would probably change out the food bowl and hay in the cage but until the mice are caught it will be an ongoing problem that you can't do anything about. Definitely store hay and pellets in a lidded container. When storing hay in a sealed container check it frequently for any smell of dampness each time you open it.
I doubt chinchillas are going to notice the mice are there most of the time. The last time we had mice was in a house in Texas when the weather got cold. The neighborhood was in a fairly wild area so it didn't matter how clean the house was. We killed about 10 of them before the problem subsided (using snap traps) and used a ton of weather stripping and foam to seal the house better. At the time I didn't have a chinchilla but a parrot in a large cage. We made sure to keep the area around the cage super clean after that.