Open their eyes......then died.

Up untill now I have had no issues with my rats. While cleaning out my snake rack yesterday I noticed that my 8 little ratties that had just opened their eyes were very lethargic. They seemed alot smaller then my previous litters and would not move very much. One which i thought was dead was actually barely breathing. Then I go out today and see that they are all dead (and it seems the parents took it upon themselves to eat most of their innards). Why would something like this happen? All of my other rats are fine and they are kept in the same rack. Actually, as I type this I remember an incident that happened last week. I sprayed bug spray around the outdoor closet I keep my rats in (to keep bugs out), well I forgot to close one of my tubs and the mother of those ratties got out. In the morning she was curled up in a bag of extra bedding and I put her back. Could she have chewed on something that had bug poison and it effect the babies mayhaps? would that kill babies that old?
Sorry for the wall of text, just kind of bummed to have all those babies die for nothing.
Gonzalo

Sorry to hear your loss of a litter. Could have been possible that the mama rat didn't nurse them enough or abandoned them. Or worse, poisoning from the bug spray.

Next time a rat gets loose I would just put it down to prevent that rat from doing harm its litter. You can't know for sure what it has eaten while it was out. Just a good thing to practice.

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I agree, once I lose a rat it's not going back into my tubs.

Sorry for the loss, replacing a whole litter when you don't breed a lot is no fun :(

I will start doing that, didnt know that was common practice. Yeah losing an entire litter means buying super expensive feeder for a 2 weeks. I only have 2 producing females, though I am currently raising 4 more breeder females.
Thanks