Need Some Suggestions...

[Lobo_Reptiles]

Well I was thinking about breeding rats. I now have 6 snakes that will need to be fed. Icelos can take rat pinks or fuzzies, my new female BP takes hopper rats and Ashes will too when I get him, Hades takes small rats, and Chimera and Kozma take medium rats.

I guess what I'm asking is, is it worth it to breed them? How long will it take them to get to a reasonable size to feed the big boys? I figured I'd get one of those layered plastic storage containers on wheels that you can slide the drawers out. I saw somewhere else that somebody used them so I figured I could.

Anyways, how would I go about finding rats that are ready to mate? Should I get 2 large rats or are they just large because of their breed not neccesarily their age? I guess I really need to know everything, their care, breeding them etc....help

[tigerlily]

There are a lot of threads about this. You might try searching a bit and refining those questions, just a tad. For me, the whole getting attached and hassle factor just make breeding my own rats unrealistic. It something you have to figure out a bit for yourself. You need to price stuff like bedding, rodent blocks, and caging. Plus you have to figure our where to keep the ever expanding rodent colony. I know there are a lot of people that love breeding rats. Sorry I wish I could be a bit more helpful.

[Shelby]

I'll just say.. DON'T use a plastic storage drawer thing. The rats WILL chew out of it and you will have wasted your money. Get either wire cages, or lab style rodent cages. Big apple herp has nice ones..

If you have trouble finding answers to any of your questions, don't hesitate to ask.

[sweety314]

I just started raising our own. Our first pair started out as snake food, and by the time the snake would eat, the rats were too big. Peekaboo had her first litter a month after being with Scabbers. None of my snakes needed pinkies, so I raised the first of them to just over 2 weeks, (fuzzies) & fed to the rats. The fancy rat sites say not to wean until 5 weeks (4 minimum) but Peek started weaning at 3. By then they all had fur and their eyes were open. I fed some and they were the right size for the snakes.

At 4-5 weeks, they were getting too big for my needs, so I euthanized and froze them. My Pissy Snake just took the first one for the first time last week. He's been on live adult mice for about 2.5 months, but he's since taken a FT rat pup. I tried again early this morning after work, but he refused.

My daughter just got a baby corn, and it's still needing MICE pinkies. I've got 3 females preggers right now, and I bought some frozen because I didn't know how soon the mice would pop and I didn't want to run out.

I knew going into it that I'd be doing in the litter, but it was hard. I don't know about your area, but it cost me $45 to get the hose, CO2 bottle, valve, etc. in order to gas them. Beside the bedding, feed, blocks/salt, housing to keep them all healthy. I did it because shipping is sooooooooo expensive for me to get the FT from a vendor, but I may change my mind after a while. Peek and Scabbers are pets now anyway, so it doesn't matter one way or another. I am thinking of breeding her again, so that I can freeze some rat pinkies for Wrigley. He's upchucked the rat pup and the mice I've fed him, so this next time I'll try something smaller again.

[Lobo_Reptiles]

Shipping is really expensive for me too otherwise I'd order frozen off the bat. But now that I have such an array of sizes of snakes, it seems like it should be a good idea to breed. Most other threads are dealing with people breeding to have the little rats to feed. I just want to know if it is worth breeding them because I'd have to wait until they get up to a medium size to feed half of my snakes. And if so, what size rat should I get to breed? Jumbo?

[Shelby]

Get large rats to breed.. you shouldn't need jumbo, and jumbo rats will be older anyway. Rats don't live that long so better to get young breeder size rats!

[Wild Bill]

The best size for breeder rats is 3-4 months of age. They can breed when smaller but not quite as efficient at it. Research local feed or seed stores for bedding and rodent chow, seems to be alot cheaper at these type of facilities. Dont use the plastic drawer sytems because they can chew out of them. I have a thread in the feeder section for a rat rack I built. This works very good. I have 20 or so snakes and breeding my own is more cost effective, plus I will soon be having a surplus that I can sell locally to get back some of my investment. Good Luck!!

Here is link to thread.

Bill

[recycling goddess]

be careful with stuff you get from feed stores though... as often there can be mites living in the bedding... whenever i get anything from there it goes right into the freezer to kill anything on it.

personally i've given up on feed stores due to the amount of times i ended up with mites.

[Wild Bill]

be careful with stuff you get from feed stores though... as often there can be mites living in the bedding... whenever i get anything from there it goes right into the freezer to kill anything on it.

personally i've given up on feed stores due to the amount of times i ended up with mites.

Feed stores with mites??? The feed store I go to carries no animals whatsoever and get their bedding directly from the manufacturer. I could see that happening more at retail and pet stores that carry animals, the only way they can get snake mites in the bedding is being in contact or nearby to snakes that are infested. Does your feed store carry animals?

[Shelby]

I think she means rodent mites.