Mice and Rodents Science Fair Projects

Mice and rodents science fair projects are great options if you are interested in working with live animals. However, there are extra steps that you will need to take if you are interested in experimenting with your pet rodents. Science fair rules state that you must meet specific rules for the ethical and humane treatement of test animals. Check with your school. Some do not allow any animal science fair projects.

Below are five safe live animal zoology science experiments that you can complete.

The first experiment option that you have for mice and rodents science fair projects is a maze experiment. In this experiment you will be testing the problem solving skills of male rats and comparing them too those of female rats. For this experiment you will time how long it takes each group of rats to get through a maze. You will then compare the times to see which sex of rat is smarter.

Another experiment opiton that you have for mice and rodents science fair projects is to see how artificial lights affect noctural rodents. For these types of biology science fair projects you will expose your rodents to artificial light at night to see if it will impact their natural biorythms. This experiment will take a least a week to complete. You can set up a video camera to monitor your rodents at night while you sleep.

The third option that you have for elementary science fair projects is to test which sense is more important to rodents, their sense of smell or their sense of vision. This is a two part experiment. The first experiment will have a rodents run a maze with cheese being the reward at the end of the maze. This maze will be open so the rodents can smell the prize. The second experiment will remove the smelly prize and the rodent will run the maze without a smell target. Your job will be to compare if the rodents solve mazes quicker when they rely on their vision or when they rely on their sense of smell.

The fourth option is to see if rodents have any color preferences. The set up of this experiment will include several plastic, color blocks and several mice. Lay out the blocks so they are spread apart. Then let the mice wander free and see which color they migrate toward. Your job will be to determine if the mice seemed to prefer one color over another, of if they randomly go to blocks.

The final option that you have is to see if music affects rodents' behavior. In this experiment you will need to make observations about mice behavior when they are exposed to different types of music. The control experiment for this experiment will be no music. In your journal not how active the mice are, how much they interact with each other and how aggressive or affectionate they seem to be.