Breeding Male Rat

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Originally Posted by Halfdawg

I am looking at setting up 12 tubs with 1 female in each tub. The male will visit female 1 for one week the female 2 for one week and so on, untill he visit all 12 females and then start over with female 1. The question is can he handle all this breeding or do I need to have 2 male's and switch off males and let one male breed for a week and the other male breed the next week giving the male one week on one week off?

Thanks Richard

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This is a good plan assuming you want live rats every week? This is how I have my breeding colony set up - except I have 3 females in each of the 12 tubs.

If you can feed F/T then grouping the females together in fewer tubs would be easier (as you will have more babies at one time but can freeze off the excess till needed).

Depends on how many and what type/size you need.

As for the male I would have at least 2 males. Their potency will go down with constant breeding. I usually change males in my rotation every 4 weeks.

I think there is something to that theory Sean. We've noticed smaller males that go into the breeding cycles and suddenly they put some major size on basically overnight. I've seen this over and over so I'm assuming breeding repeatedly pushes those testerone levels into overdrive. We have a lot of males so no one cycles out of the bachelor pad for too long a time. This may also be why they are "remembered" by the colony and no fights occur.

So from what I have read, I will use male #1 for breeding on week 1,3,5,7,9,11 and male #2 on week 2,4,6,8,10,12 not a bad schedule one week on one week off. Then next year when the amount on balls triple I can have 2 or 3 females per tub.
I may even see if I can sell off excess. I have noticed that alot of the pet shops around are closing and I think alot of people that only have 1 or 2 snakes are going to have a hard time find feeders.

Thanks Richard

Sean,

i was just curious how many snakes do you feed?

Richard, if you have any sort of herp club local to you I'd join it and then you're likely to meet a lot of those snake owners.