New rats died!

Last week, Oct. 18, I bought 10 pinks, 10 fuzzies, 15 pups, 15 jumbo females, and 4 jumbo males. In the last week I keep finding them dead. So far I have lost 4 females and 2 males, but all of my pinks and fuzzies are doing great with their surogate (sp) moms. I had 2 of my females give birth in the last week and their pinks are doing great.

I use Swan for their bedding, it is kiln dried pine shavings and it does NOT have a lot of dust. I feed them Mazuri 6F. I put in an automatic watering system using the edstrom vari-flow valves and checked all valves to make sure they are releasing water. I check them each individually every other day or every two days to make sure they are still working.

I posted what my rat rack looks like finished.

Is their something wrong with what I am doing? I have given them on a couple occasions some graham crackers just as a treat sort of thing. I am really feeling bad here. Not sure what I am doing wrong. Any help would be awesome.

If I forgot any detail please ask so I can get it figured out.

I'm assuming they don't have any injuries or symptoms of illness? The only other things I can think of would be possible a foreign substance in the water, or in the air. Or they might just be old. They only live around 2 years on average.

Honestly the only thing I can come up with is they were too old when I bought them. All of the rats are on the same water source and everything. I am just new to breeding them so I want to make sure I am doing it right.

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Originally Posted by MikeM75

Honestly the only thing I can come up with is they were too old when I bought them. All of the rats are on the same water source and everything. I am just new to breeding them so I want to make sure I am doing it right.

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It sounds like you are doing everything right. :gj:

I also use pine bedding, and I feed Native Earth or Mazuri depending on which is cheaper. Graham crackers wouldn't hurt them either. Mushrooms are also a good treat, and can help prevent tumors.