The maze from my last experiment was far too easy for the mice to learn
so I set out to build a bigger most maze one that I could configure.
This new most maze is based on a eight by eight and I can move the walls
any way I want to.
I made this maze configurable
because I'm not sure what will work best with the mice
My goal is to get the mouse really deep into the maze
and that it won't find its way out again.
And here comes the first mouse
and it's mostly just loitering on the maze
chewing all the peanut butter that's in there.
So let's play that back a little bit faster.
That looks like some panicking there it doesn't know it's way out.
Out already.
I guess that mouse was undaunted by that little bit of panic
because it's right back exploring and eating peanut butter.
I'm quite surprised that mouse seems to have learned that maze
amazingly fast I think much faster than a person would have learned it.
And here comes another visitor, this one is a shrew.
And this one seems to be quite systematic even the first time
exploring the maze it doesn't look like it ever got lost in there.
And the mouse is back but we've kind of run out of peanut butter in the maze
Time to add bait to the maze again
and this time I'm adding some sunflower seeds
Leads so the mice have reason to go back as they stash it somewhere else.
And by now the shrew's gotten into a routine
of hauling away sunflower seeds
And here comes another mouse, this one's a little bit bigger than the last one.
And once the mouse has found the pile of sunflower seeds
it mostly keeps going back and forth stashing sunflower seeds
somewhere else.
Not that the vermin has gotten all used to this layout
it's time to push it up a bit.
I think the change in maze layout
has that mouse a little bit confused at first
But there's work to be done eating all that fresh peanut butter
throughout the maze.
Oh, I think that's looking panicky there
I think it got just a little bit lost.
But, just after a few trips back and forth
I think that mouse has fully learned the new layout
and it's not making anymore mistakes.
And, here comes the shrew again and that layout
of course is new to it as well.
I don't know why but that shrew decided that all those sunflower seeds
needed to be somewhere else.
With the most and shrew having learned the best path
through the maze I opened up a short cut just to see how they'd react to that
And the shrew takes the long way around, force of habit I guess.
And a long way back out although it did seem to hesitate at the short cut
And it looks like it found the shortcut
although it seems to be a little bit confused by it.
And here comes the little black mouse which finds the short cut right away
but then also seems to be a little bit confused.
And last comes the big brown mouse
which is also going the long way
never mind it found the short cut right away.
And here comes the shrew again which doesn't seem to remember the short cut
It doesn't seem to be as smart as the mice.
Time to re-bait the maze
I'm adding a few blocks that the mouse has to push out of the way
just to see how it will react to that.
And here comes the shrew.
And I guess it has to eat all the peanut butter that's available first.
Maybe I shouldn't have put quite as much bait in that maze
because it just keep eating that
without actually exploring any further.
And here comes the little mouse
which is exploring what is pushed apart
but nothing beyond that and then the bigger mouse,
It doesn't seem to want to push it either.
Now the little mouse again, and...
It doesn't seem to be keen on pushing aside any walls.
I kind of regret how much bait I put in the maze
because it just stalls them everywhere
too much snack time.
Hey, get out of here this maze is occupied.
I guess inherently they're just very careful
which might explain how they managed to get the bait out of a trap
so many times without setting it off.
But the shrew is much less careful.
And the mouse is back but again not moving anything.
But what I realized is the mice and the Shrew both had no difficulty
getting past blocks that partially obstructed the passage ways
So, realistically passageways don't need to be nearly as wide
as I've got them here.
It's also quite clear that the shrew is quite the bull in a china shop
compared to the mouse
With the amazing agility of my test subjects,
I decided to make a maze with much finer detail
so that hopefully they'd finally get lost in there.
I ran a wire through the maze to help me track which way to get through it.
And the first one in is once again the shrew.
who is little bit tight in there but doesn't seem to have difficulty
getting around it too much and is losing no time exploring that maze
Ta da. Yum, yum, yum, yum, yum.
This is playing back at about 12 times actual speed
but still that shrew is able to get through there amazingly fast.
And that shrew just kept going back and forth
he just totally owned that maze.
It might be politically correct to call him a he but I'll just assume he's a he.
Okay, now it's the mouse's turn.
What, that's it? Come on, try a little harder.
And here comes the shrew again who by now is just an old hand at this maze.
Come on little mouse, you can do it. Ahhh.
So I'm changing the maze so the proper path is actually where
the most kept checking not where the Shrew always goes
and I'm also gonna make it a little bit tighter
so that hopefully the Shrew will get stuck.
Whoa, I didn't expect it to make it through that gap.
I guess I didn't make that maze nearly tight enough.
This was a narrowest gap I had the shrew go through last time
I still have this gap but I closed it off and I made
a lot of other narrow gaps
all through the maze just to make it more fun
and I've also made the path a bit longer
like it has to snake around here now, so let's see what happens next.
Well it seems those tight spots
are not enough to deter that shrew
cause it makes it through all of them it sure is determined.
Oh, it's stuck on the final gap so near and yet so far.
To all the PETA and SJW folks out there I should point out
that the actions of the Shrew are fairly voluntary
I'm not to making it do anything.
And once again it turned around.
Wow, it's finally made it through.
Now most of these clips have been playing much faster than real life,
but this clip is showing actual speed
It takes about 30 seconds to go through the maze
and considering all the contortions that's actually amazingly fast. It takes about 30 seconds to go through the maze
and considering all the contortions that's actually amazingly fast.
And here's the little mouse again. Come on.
But the shrew just keeps plugging away at it
back and forth and back and forth.
Come on mouse, you can do it.