My first litter just arrived!

[sinclair]

My hooded rat just gave birth to her first litter. I have her in a 106 qt tub with another female and the male. I have a large plastic hide that she has the babies in with the other female, and it looks like the male has been kicked out. I was wondering when it would be okay to count the pinks and handle them. The mom is very sociable with me and her behavior hasn't changed throughout her pregnancy. Advice on what to do or not to do would be appreciated. Thanks!

[Crazymonkee]

My advice is wait 3 days for mom and babes to bond. Congrats!

[ROACH]

Ive handled my babies right after birth with no problems for cleaning. Dont know if its the right thing to do, but I have!

[BHReptiles]

Congrats!

I can't wait to experience this myself! I've got one, maybe two females that are pregnant.

[Marrissa]

I handle them whenever. I've had three litters so far and counted the last two groups on day one. Of course since my current breeding group are biters I used a gloved hand to pull babies out.

[DooLittle]

I count/clean whenever I need to. And if my daughter spots the pinks first, she always has to "say hi" to them all. My mommas are fine. Grats on the babies!

[Kat_Dog]

Congrats! I've had 2 litters so far

The first one scared the crap out of me because I thought she still had a week to go and when I opened her tub she went running to the other side with a bunch of pink things following @.@

I waited 3 days to start handling the pinks, though, I bet I could have handled them immediately and it would have been fine. Rat moms are really good at what they do

[kc261]

Good rat mothers won't abandon their pinks or eat them or any such thing if you handle the babies right away. However, since it is your first litter, you have no idea how good of a mother you have. I'd recommend waiting a day or two before you mess around too much.

Whether or not they'll bite you is a different issue. I've read that even very tame females can sometimes become aggressive when protecting their babies. In my colony, the ones that I've raised since birth have so far shown no tendency in that direction, but the original females that weren't terribly tame when we got them did bite me a few times when they had pinks.

[shadowsnakes]

My two hooded girls become every aggressive and serious biters when pups are around, but they are good moms so I won't cull them for a while. When the lid comes off they scamper to the other side and I can count, handle, clean, etc without too much fuss. Newborn or week old it doesn't seem to matter.

[sinclair]

Thanks for all the input. I went ahead and lifted the hide and counted them later that day. There were 13 of them! Later in the day I counted 12, and then today I found 11, and a half eaten one, in the nest. Maybe 13 was too many for her? She hasn't seemed to mind me handling them, even when she is in the nest. She's a really sweet gal, but has one quirk. If you put your finger at the top of the wire mesh, she will attack it ferociously. She does this to any object placed there. I first noticed this a few weeks before the birth, so I don't think it's related to pregnancy. I've never fed them through the lid, and first noticed this behavior before I added a food hopper that hangs from the lid. Perhaps some rats just have an instinct to attack/bite things through wires? She's a pet store rat that lived in a glass enclosure there, so I can't imagine it's a learned behavior. The other two just come up and sniff your fingers and maybe nibble extremely lightly. Other than this she has shown absolutely no signs of aggression.