Worst Litter Ever

She's been done for awhile...sorry got busy and didn't get the photo resized and posted (I'm watching a friend's 6 year old plus my own almost 5 year old...ack!)

Here's the new litter....11 big healthy pinks....none lost at birth....all are kicking and squeeking and looking for food LOL. When I removed Flash to check the pinks most of them were latched on and nursing strongly. She did beautifully for a first litter. This pic I took purposely wide to show the entire birthing area...hard to believe she'd just had 11 babies in that spot isn't it!

After I did the quick photo, Flash got busy and hauled them all off across the tank and set up directly beside her water bottle. A few of my females do this....smart things can then nurse and all they have to do to get a drink themselves is turn their heads!

https://ball-pythons.net/gallery/fil...than1hrold.jpg
Litter of 11 pinks less than 1 hour old born March 4, 2006 (Flash x Casanova)

This is the litter I will be following with pictures and measurements as they go through each stage of development.


~~Jo~~

aahhhhh they are so cute. look just like mouse pinkies :)

LOL yep just a whole sight bigger!


~~Jo~~

Had to resurrect this old thread to update you all on Alita the pet store preggie rat rescue.

After the disaster of her first litter I've let her rest and build back up. She found a good buddy in another female we have called Midnite and they both went into breed with Casanova when they looked in perfect condition to do so. Well Sunday Midnite delivered her first litter of 14 nice healthy pinks but Alita was still holding on and probably the most pregnant rat I've ever seen. Poor thing was as big as a tennis ball and I swear could barely touch ground. After her horrible first litter I was worried that maybe she was retaining her litter too long.

Shouldn't have worried really. Yesterday with perfect ease she popped out 16 nice chubby pinks. No mess like last time and she immediately did the usual excellent care female rats do for their young. I guess her previous litter was such a disaster as she was in awful shape after she delivered. I couldn't tell till then how thin she actually was under the preggie bulk. This time around she was nice and chunky herself so obviously better able to deliver such a nice big healthy litter for us.

I'm really glad Alita's done well. I try to not get overly attached to our rats, but the breeders are special to me and Alita especially so. Oh btw we kept back two of her females from that first litter....a really nicely marked black and white husky I call Panda and a nice self colored ruby eyed beige that we call Ruby. They were very big female weans and just looked like nice future breeders for us. They are having the equivalent of a rat's heaven on earth, hanging out with two of HoneyChild's daughters (both beige hoodeds) called Tazz and Spazz. Nothing funnier than 4 young females without a rattie care in the world LOL.

jo i agree... that was worth sharing twice!!!!

congrats... i'm soooo pleased for ya! (and esp for her)

SO great to hear that she has fully recovered from that unnecessary ordeal! The poor thing! You're like the most awesome rat-mommy I know!

Thanks ladies! Breeder rats or not, I just hate seeing any animal bred when they aren't healthy enough to do so or it will be a waste of the breeding stock or their offspring because of poor care or human stupidity. Just drives me nuts so I'm really glad that Alita is fine and obviously a very nice breeding female when cared for properly.

Good stuff Jo! I would be worried that I would get attached to all of them. Rats are the cutest when they are just weaned. Do you ever feed off the breeders or will you keep them until they die of natural causes?

good to hear that alita is doing so well now! what a nice addition to your breeding stock. :)

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Originally Posted by jglass38

Good stuff Jo! I would be worried that I would get attached to all of them. Rats are the cutest when they are just weaned. Do you ever feed off the breeders or will you keep them until they die of natural causes?

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Sorry I missed your question Jamie. We give all our breeders a chance to prove themselves with a litter or two, if they aren't able to breed or prove poor breeders we feed them off. For our good breeders we will keep them until they are ready to retire from the breeding colony and then they will just live out their lives quietly. We figure we owe them that much as they contribute a lot to the health and well being of our snakes and besides by that time we've had them a long while and they all have names (I just can't feed off something that has a name to something else that has a name...call me a softie but I can't).

Thanks for all your kind words everyone. Alita and her 16 young are doing very well and even if she hadn't done well....well she was exempt from the above LOL. I just couldn't have fed her off after all that poor rat went through but thankfully she's turned out to be a spectacular breeding female.