Babies on board

One of my females finally had babies! :banana: :banana: :banana: So again I have a few questions, Theres only 3 so far how long should it take for her to birth her whole litter? Also the females are being awfully rough with the babies, is this normal with rodents? I'll post some pics in a bit.

Rat, mouse, ASF? 3 is a very small litter for a rat. What do you mean by rough?

Rab, i think the mom is still in labor;) Good luck!

Whether it's a mouse, rat or ASF - if it's in active delivery of the litter just let her do her job without too much fussing from you. :) Especially the first time momma's can get a bit stressed if you hang about watching too closely (some could care less though LOL).

They will lick and chew at the baby to remove the cord and eat the afterbirth (it's good for the mom). They will lick and grab/mouth the baby. They are stimulating it to breath and moving it out of the way while they pop out the rest. Some new momma rats will be confused at what the heck is falling out their butt end and grab a pink and run about with it for a minute. They eventually figure it out though I've had to wait till she's done and settled and nudge one of those pinks back in with the rest.

I was getting some supplies for my new snakes and I heard a bunch of squeaking so lifted the hide and saw the babies :D I haven't been back down there yet and plan to let them be till tomorrow I thought 3 was a little low but figured she may still be birthing. I've never bred rodents, so seeing the mom kinda "chewing" at the babies had me a little nervous. Thanks for the replies! I'll get some pics tomorrow and post.

So I couldn't resist, went down to check on them all 3 babies were dead :( only 3 also I think (tiny litter), didn't want to disturb them that much. I'm at a loss, did I do something wrong :confused: They are ASF's by the way didn't realize I didn't put it in the original post. Any help would be appreciated. The females still look pregnant though.

Very hard to say really. Was the female big enough to be breeding? Was there any issues of fighting amongst the colony recently? It may have simply been a case of an inexperienced female having a poor first litter. It happens with all sorts of animals that they don't do well with mothering a first time litter.

I'd say to just monitor the situation, make sure there's no reason that female was so stressed she either delivered a poor litter or killed/consumed some of them. When she's pregnant again, see how she does and if she's just a generally poor breeder you might want to consider culling her if another litter fails.

I'm not sure if she could still be pregnant and delaying the rest of the delivery. I know that's possible in some mammals but unsure if ASF's can do this.

They all seem to be fine, no fighting that I have seen (no bite marks or anything either). I looked over the ASF forums and someone said the same thing about just beeing new to motherhood and that it happens to the first litter occasionally. As for being big enough, the breeder I got them from said they were big/old enough to breed so who knows. I'll monitor them and see. I think the other 2 females are about ready to pop as well so only time will tell. Thanks again Joanna!

You're welcome! Whether it's our ASF's or the regular ratties, I always like to give a female at least two litters to get into the stride of her breeding life. I've had females that didn't produce a really spectacular first litter that went on to produce 16 chubby pinks the next time out of the gate. If they do at least two iffy litters or show a real interest in eating their own young or true aggressive behaviour, then they are culled.