Mice keep cannibalizing litters!!

[Tash]

Not enough protein in their diet makes them do this. Learned from a breeder. Add more protein to their diets and they'll stop eating their young. They chew their hides because they are bored/stressed. Poor diet also adds to stress.

[darkranger69]

very interesting!!!! thank you, i also have this problem time to time specially when the babies are left in the breeding cage with my rats 1.3 ratio. i m making more individual boxes but still had 2 litters massacred. what do you suggest as protein food?

[Solarsoldier001]

Deborah has been in this business for a long while. I'd trust her 100% on her advice 24/7




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[Tash]

Deborah gave the best advice. And since I am not a breeder I couldn't tell you the best. I know the breeder I went through let her mice chew on chicken bone and gave them bugs, among other things. People are always sharing their diet mixtures and advice on how they achieve a higher protien. Hopefully someone will chime in and share their recipes with you.

[stickyalvinroll]

Feed them better

[JayRo626]

It has 18% protein, and most of the same ingredients as any lab block you feed them. I even still give them some actual mouse food. If it were the food, wouldn't all my animals be cannibalizing their babies? It's only this group. It doesn't matter anyways, as I am now having to sell all my breeders.

[GoingPostal]

Try separating out your moms into smaller groups, 1-2 per cage. Agreed that the food is garbage and changing to something better would be wise, you want quality food going into your feeders, not stuff full of crappy dyes and cancer causing preservatives.

[Fraido]

How come you have to sell them?

[cchardwick]

I also just had my first batch of mouse babies and found them right when the mice were eating the young. I did a full cage clean and disinfected everything, within an hour or so they were giving birth and eating their young. In my case I think it was just bad timing to be cleaning the cages, but I had to, it's the weekend and the only time I can do weekly cleanings. I feed really good, I feed a mix of Masuri, pig pellets with 16% protein, chicken scratch, just started adding some nutty bird food (almost all nuts), also feed a lot of fruit and veggies including oranges, snow peas, carrots, broccoli, cauliflower, etc.. I separated my females, hopefully I'll get one or two young out of the deal. If not I'm considering feeding the adults to my ball pythons. I have another batch of young mice that haven't bred yet, maybe I'll have better luck with that batch. I also have ASFs that just had a batch of babies as well as several pairs of regular rats. I started with all three types of rodents and will see who fairs best! I like the idea of separating my females into pairs and rotating the male through. If someone cannibalizes at least they all won't learn to eat their young, seems like my whole tank ended up with that bad habit, I'm guessing it's a learned behavior.

[wilomn]

Unless Doggie Brand has changed their formula it's still fine. Some mice are just cannibals. If all your other animals are doing fine and not eating babies my guess would be that these individuals, because of genetics or environment, are simply baby eaters. If my mice eat a first litter I let it go, if they eat a second they go to the snakes.