Question about litters

So i put 2 moms together who were going to have their babies.

One mom had her babies and drug em to the nest.

Well a few hours later the second mom had her babies. Now when i woke up the one mom had the babies from both litters in her nest and is sitting on them while the other mom just walks around lost?

Is this going to be a problem? What should i do with the other mom?

I would keep them apart if its possible, at least till the pinks get older, that way the pinks will most likely do better without having to fight for a nipple as much. But if you cant keep them apart, its pretty normal for one mom to steal all the babies.

My girl had 19 and nursed them just fine.

They SHOULD be taking turns nursing. It's only the first day, so just keep an eye on them.

I highly suggest separating them before they give birth. I have had moms fight over the babies, and it does not turn out pretty. When I used to breed, I had a birthing rack. Each pregnant female would be put in her own tub until she laid and weaned the babies.

I keep two females together to birth alot. They help each other out raising the babies. Sometimes, they will drag the babies from one nest to the other for hours at a time, can be humourous at times...

Very rarely do I have females that kill each others babies, but it does happen from time to time.

I also will take huge litters of 15 or more, and seperate a few of them into a mom that may only have 5 or 6, kind of equal out the litter sizes without problems.
Rats are very good mothers to theirs and other pups...

I don't separate and have had pretty good results. I have had mothers move babies around from one nest to another and only on rare occasions have seen babies hurt from it.

i run 8-9 females at once, never separate. they almost always do a comunitty pile and take turns nursing. i find this works quite well and its way way way way way easier on me than seperating out over 100 preggo females every month, eff that lol

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Originally Posted by BAMReptiles

i run 8-9 females at once, never separate. they almost always do a comunitty pile and take turns nursing. i find this works quite well and its way way way way way easier on me than seperating out over 100 preggo females every month, eff that lol

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100 preggo females? LOL.

I should be so lucky.

I have about 800 females popping off every month.

My run of the mill feeder stuff stays together, harem style, and my good fancy stuff gets separated into birthing racks.

If you do a side by side comparison you will find out that birthing racks will make you more productive (per female).

i've heard several times that birthing racks are the way to go, so I started a few months ago with a trial run... Way more production, I'm switching all my rats over to a birthing rack as soon as I get it built.
I tried it with 28 tubs, and my numbers went way up over the 3 months I tried it. i left all my other rats in 1.2 lab cages. I was impressed how many babies I produced in just 28 tubs over such a short time. Less deaths, cleaner, and less stress on the mommas. Although, it is a bit more work to move them around. But, i found that for the first two weeks after birth, you don't even have to clean the tubs out, so that's a major plus.
So, I just bought 70 more tubs and watering valves... Now I just gotta find the time to build build build...
My harem racks are getting disassembled for parts.