Babies!!! Help!

Becky what do you recommend to keep mice as least stressed as possible?

I set them up 1.2 or right now I have 1.3 in a 10-gallon and will take the male out in a week or so. Then I feed and water them, and leave them ALONE. I may bother them once a week and that is to clean and feed. They have babies(FAT BABIES), large litters and rarely, if ever, cannibalize one, single baby. I have some moms that I "know" very well, and can mess with them and their babies without a single protest, but others I have learned that they don't tolerate it well, so I just leave them alone as much as possible.

Make sure they have enough food, bedding to burrow in, shredded paper, toilet paper tubes, soft things(kleenes, paper towels), plenty of water and make very sure they are in a cool place. They don't appreciate being hot and don't produce well at all. Cold doesn't seem to bother them much I've found. I kept most of the mice in the garage all winter(what winter, it's Texas), and they did fine.

I feed mine lab blocks(Mazuri or Harlan) as well as some Purina Senior, some occassional baby food such as sweet potatoes, chicken and gravy, turkey and gravy, and some fruits such as apples, bananas. No citrus, the same as rats. They like the wild bird food that has the nuts, fruit and black oil sunflower seeds in it. Makes 'em fatties!

Ok.. do you think keeping them in groups of more than 1.3 would stress them out? Mine have lots of bedding and I give them paper towel tubes and egg crates to hide in and chew on. They always have food and water, and I'm going to order the mazuri lab blocks for them (can't find it locally anywhere grrr)

I don't bother them either except for cage cleaning.

Shop vac's make great cage cleaners, and if you accidently suck up a rat you automatically have a p/k feeder for your snakes.

Haven't ever seen a shop vac kill even a baby rat. A friend of mine, who is a breeder, accidentally sucks them up all the time. When she looks in the tub full of bedding, she sees the baby looking up at her like "WAHOO! LET'SDOITAGAIN!". Haha!

I kept my mice at 1.2 and they did awesome until I separated the male out. The females are raising the last group of little turds, but they also adopted 5 newborn pinks from the feed store(needed pinks for the cornsnake). I put them in with one mom who I knew was a very good mom, and she did just fine.

The least you can do to maintain them and keep them healthy and fed, the better. I keep 3 tanks in my garage. One 10g full of 10 smallish females, 1 10g full of 10 bigger females, and one 10g with various sized males. The tanks are covered with thick towels just in case it gets below 50 degrees, and they also are sitting on top of our stand-up freezer so the heat from that will heat the cages a bit. Works great. Inside the house I have 1 10g with 1.3 that I just put together tonight(they only have dog food unfortunately as the lab blocks don't come in until Friday), and they squabbled a bit, but otherwise are fine. The other tank is filled with 2 moms, 5 very hoppity hoppers, and 5 pinks, all fine and dandy.

What I have found is(and I have bought/raised/borrowed from school alot of mice) that Petsmart's mice are incredibly healthy, produce good litters and are good moms. Even as first time moms they do a great job and I have never had any cannibalizing from them.

Now, mice from Petco or other "off" shops don't fair as well. Don't have as healthy of immune systems, litter sizes aren't as big and they may cannibalize their young regardless of the reason(just because, usually).

This is just my experience in all of this and not meant to be any sort of statistic or anything. I guess I just have good luck with the little buggers.

Also, I have found that when I keep a good number of males(10+) together, there are rarely any fights and they do not smell(other than the dirty cage smell). I have a friend who has only one of my males and you can smell him(in his newly cleaned cage, mind you) from across the room. Why? I have no idea... Nasty thing.

I don't know, mice are just weird, but once you figure out the little kinks in their behavior, it's all gravy.

Hope that answered some of your questions. If ya have any more, just ask :)

Well for one, not to be rude, but please don't have such an attitude when responding. I have 1.2 rats. Frank is a girl. And how am I supposed to "expect" babies when I have only had my male for 2 weeks. Correct me if I'm wrong but gestation period for rats is 21+ days. Please don't treat me like I'm irresponsible.

Thanks for the help but when I was asking for it I was hoping a semi-warm helping squad not the Spanish Inquisition coupled with those thinking that I am incompetent. I'll be sure to go elsewhere for help next time.

Becky, I have noticed the same thing. Unfortunately my petsmart (that I work at) only sells male mice, and the only place I've found to sell female mice at reasonable prices is petco.. but they take horrid care of their animals! They had flies in their mouse cages. :bleh:

Perhaps I will have to go to the reptile swap to get some girls.. the petco females are cannibalizing like mad, (killing each other as well as babies)

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Originally Posted by HadesBP18

Well for one, not to be rude, but please don't have such an attitude when responding. I have 1.2 rats. Frank is a girl. And how am I supposed to "expect" babies when I have only had my male for 2 weeks. Correct me if I'm wrong but gestation period for rats is 21+ days. Please don't treat me like I'm irresponsible.

Thanks for the help but when I was asking for it I was hoping a semi-warm helping squad not the Spanish Inquisition coupled with those thinking that I am incompetent. I'll be sure to go elsewhere for help next time.

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I did not see any attitudes :) Always remember....alot is lost in internet converstion.....so cause of concern may seem harsh at times....

....All great advice.

And YES. Some pet stores love to 'dump off' preg. mice and rats to avoid having to care for the babies. I usually watch for this when I go in pet stores because you can actually get a bunch of mice or rats for the price of one. But for someone like Hades, this stuff can become a pain when you don't expect it. I am sure they will all be ok...mice and rats are very easy to keep and breed...no matter what anyone else says:)

Kelly you have my apology for assuming Frank was a male when indeed she is not. I hope that you have success with this unplanned litter so that you end up with either good healthy pet or feeder rats.



~~Jo~~

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Originally Posted by srozell

Shop vac's make great cage cleaners, and if you accidently suck up a rat you automatically have a p/k feeder for your snakes.

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Originally Posted by SatanicIntention

Haven't ever seen a shop vac kill even a baby rat. A friend of mine, who is a breeder, accidentally sucks them up all the time. When she looks in the tub full of bedding, she sees the baby looking up at her like "WAHOO! LET'SDOITAGAIN!". Haha!

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ROFLMAO! :rofl: