asf's and mazuri 6f

Has anyone had any problems getting ASF's to eat Mazuri 6f? I am also feeding wild bird seed and carrots... they have had the 6f for about a week, and so far they just don't seem very interested in it (was previously using becky's rat mix)

I assume right now that they are just being picky... and once they get really hungry they will chow down on it...


Mike

I've read that they don't eat very much anyways. They may still be being selective about what they want to eat, prefer palatabilty over nutrition... Other than that many people have great success with 9F or harlan 2018.

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Originally Posted by mcavana

Has anyone had any problems getting ASF's to eat Mazuri 6f? I am also feeding wild bird seed and carrots... they have had the 6f for about a week, and so far they just don't seem very interested in it (was previously using becky's rat mix)

I assume right now that they are just being picky... and once they get really hungry they will chow down on it...


Mike

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We use Mazuri 6F exclusively for all of our rodents. We raise mice, rats and ASFRs and have had no problems relating to feed.

Thanks for the replies... so how long have you been breeding ASF's? You use 6f exclusively???? You don't have to feed the ASF's anything but 6F???!!!

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Originally Posted by mcavana

Thanks for the replies... so how long have you been breeding ASF's? You use 6f exclusively???? You don't have to feed the ASF's anything but 6F???!!!

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Mike, we have been breeding ASFRs for almost 2 years. I bought a couple of trios in late spring of '06 and we now maintain 10-12 trios in addition to our mice and rats.

They have been feed only Mazuri 6F, except for an occasional treat of sunflower seeds. I know that doesn't quite fit the definition of exclusive, but their diet is over 99% Mazuri 6F.

thanks for the reply louis!

If I could just feed 6f, that would make life much easier! sure I will still throw in another treat every now and then...

Do you have any problems with canabalism??? My local pet shop was having a problem with it, and they believed it was because they were only feeding 6f.

Also, one more question... i have a food dispencer made from hardware cloth... so it doesn't get wasted on the floor for the most part. when you do this, does the Mazuri go bad after a few days? if so, at what point should you toss out the old, and put new in?

I have never thrown out our food. My rats get enough for a week, but still... I have never thrown it out if they didn't consume it.

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Originally Posted by mcavana

thanks for the reply louis!

If I could just feed 6f, that would make life much easier! sure I will still throw in another treat every now and then...

Do you have any problems with canabalism??? My local pet shop was having a problem with it, and they believed it was because they were only feeding 6f.

Also, one more question... i have a food dispencer made from hardware cloth... so it doesn't get wasted on the floor for the most part. when you do this, does the Mazuri go bad after a few days? if so, at what point should you toss out the old, and put new in?

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We have had some problems when they are crowded. We keep ours in 1.2 or 1.3 groups. Once the babies are weaned, it's best to remove them from the breeding group.

They don't seem to take well to "strangers", so we use siblings to set up new breeding groups. Just seems to work better for us.

We've never had a spoilage problem with the 6F. We have food "hoppers" on our cages/racks that hold several days worth of food and we just top them off when needed. We never have to discard food.

I hope that helps you. Let me know if you have other questions. Good luck with yours.

I definately have a hard time getting my ASF's to eat the rat block. They tear up any seeds though. They especially like the millet that is in the seed mix. I put in a small handful of block 2 weeks ago and it is mostly still there, scattered in the bedding.

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Originally Posted by Louis Kirkland

We have had some problems when they are crowded. We keep ours in 1.2 or 1.3 groups. Once the babies are weaned, it's best to remove them from the breeding group.

They don't seem to take well to "strangers", so we use siblings to set up new breeding groups. Just seems to work better for us.

We've never had a spoilage problem with the 6F. We have food "hoppers" on our cages/racks that hold several days worth of food and we just top them off when needed. We never have to discard food.

I hope that helps you. Let me know if you have other questions. Good luck with yours.

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Very interesting. when you take out the babies once are they are weaned, do you just throw them together with same size babies from other breeding groups?

I am using 10 gallon tanks. what would you consider "overcrouded" for grow up tanks?

Last, but not least... So you never have to put new blood into the colony??? In other words, you never have to put a newbee in to mix up the gene pool a bit?

Thanks again for taking the time to answer all my questions!