Trial

Kings and corns can handle prey up to 1.5X the diameter of the largest part of the snake. They should be okay w/ 1-2 day old rat pinks, especially by the time you start breeding the rats. Even if this is a little on the large size by then, it woun't be long before they are normal, then too small for the corn and king, and you can start feeding older pinks and fuzzies. I'd go w/ rats.

i think keeping the in wire cages and then moving the mom would work. i always move my rats to a separate tub when they are close to giving birth and they do fine.

I could feed rat pinkies. Is there a picture anywhere that could show the size comparison of a mouse hopper and rat pinky?

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Originally Posted by Jay_Bunny

I could feed rat pinkies. Is there a picture anywhere that could show the size comparison of a mouse hopper and rat pinky?

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Mice hoppers - Length (Inches): 1.50 - 2.00* Weight (Grams): 8.00 - 12.00
Rat pinkies - Length (Inches): 1.50 - 2.00* Weight (Grams): 3.00 - 8.00
Rat fuzzies - Length (Inches): 2.00 - 2.50* Weight (Grams): 9.00 - 19.00

These are the sizes and weights listed on a rodent supplier's website. They also use a larger breed of rat, so normal rats might be a little smaller than this.

rodent pro has good photos on their site: http://www.rodentpro.com

I think Zim could eat a rat pinky no problem. They look smaller than a mouse hopper.

So, I guess I'll be getting some rats this summer. Are males ok by themselves? Or should I get two males and two females?

Just a few thoughts here. Rat pinks are significantly larger than mice pinks and they grow extremely quickly in size. Personally I'd suggest you purchase some f/t rat pinks from PetCo or somewhere like that and try your snakes on them before you consider breeding rats. You've got two snakes that can only take a very specific size of rat pink so you will need to be euthanizing litters at a pre-determined weight. With rat pinks a few days can make a huge difference in size and they will quickly outgrow your colubrid's ability to eat them. Before you breed rats you'll also need to know if your snakes will even switch over to them. Not all snakes, even colubrids will automatically go from mice to rats. I have a milksnake here that won't look twice at a rat pink but will happily take down her two hopper mice a week. She's big enough for a rat pink but simply refuses them outright.

I will definatly try the rat pinky before actually breeding. I don't plan on breeding till I get a third snake. I might even wait to get a fourth snake before breeding. I do want to have the rats for a while though and get to know them as pets. I plan on getting the females this summer (along with a third snake and a second leo.) and in the fall, a pair of female cresties.

Sounds great. I love folks that plan ahead! You can get a nice pair of lovely, healthy just weaned females and raise them up to a nice chunky 4 months old that way. It's best if your breeders are hand tamed, even if you don't want them sort of pets. I know from handling our mature rats that you really want nice tempered ones that are used to you when you are moving adults around or pulling young for feeding off purposes. Once you are ready to breed you can plan on finding a nice young male for that purpose as the males are ready to breed from 6 weeks of age onwards so can be a bit younger than your females. It really is best if you can have two males for company (never in with the females though together) or just have your male keep company with one of his own feeder sons. Rats hate being caged alone.

If you need any advice on how to pick a healthy rat or any health/genetic concerns in a rat colony there's tons of threads in the Feeder forum or just ask. There's a lot of rat breeding experience on BPNet to help you have a very successful time of it. There's a sticky here on how to do a rat colony with little space in your house. Hope that might be helpful to you.