Rat Pregnancy

I've had a 1.2 group of rats for almost 3 months now with no litters (though I've seen A LOT of breeding activity). All were virgin girls/boy from a friend of mine who breeds her own rats. I've been seeing some mixed signs from one of my girls and I'd love some information (with pictures if possible) of how you know that your females are pregnant (from how they feel to watch you can observe on them).

If you've seen active breeding, gestation is roughly 21 days after that.
The females don't really get visually huge until a week before birth or less.


A few days before birth.
https://scontent-b-lax.xx.fbcdn.net/...49934343_n.jpg

https://scontent-a-lax.xx.fbcdn.net/...29533384_o.jpg

https://scontent-a-lax.xx.fbcdn.net/...95507859_n.jpg

https://fbcdn-sphotos-a-a.akamaihd.n...50498754_o.jpg

https://fbcdn-sphotos-g-a.akamaihd.n...11160655_o.jpg

None of my females are huge but one feels pregnant. Her belly is firm versus the other female who's belly is very soft. This female with the firm belly hadn't been breeding for 2 weeks so I was so sure she was ready to pop. However, the other day, she was seen several times being mounted by the male. The other female has pretty predictable heat cycles that I can see. She usually breeds the male every week, week and a half. I'm just at a loss to how to get these rats to breed.

This was 4 days before she dropped a litter of 14.

http://i.imgur.com/ukPMX6G.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/RMc6blu.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/JbXRywB.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/mvke0vV.jpg

I put her in on the 25th of Jan and the babies were born on the 17th of feb.


If you don't see any litters soon, you may want to replace your male.

My first group was 1.2 that i got from someone local...and after about three months i also saw nothing...so i went ahead and replaced the whole group about a month ago with 2 groups of 1.3...and last week i got my first three litters...so since nothings changed, but the rats themselves...i dont think it's anything i'm doing wrong, so my suggestion would be to try another group(while maintaining ur current group) and if it's successful then make a decision about your original group.

best of luck to you..although none of my babies are big enough to feed off yet i can tell that this is going to save so much money...and it's so cool/exciting too!!

I don't really have the space at the moment to get another group at this time. My living situation is not very conducive to a large scale breeding operation. This is just to supplement my feed bill. The friend I got the rats from came over today and she confirmed my suspicion that one "feels" pregnant. however, she can't explain why she was breeding the other day.

lol satomi, that picture of your mama rat laying on her back is cute as heck