this bothers me. (re: rat/mouse breeding)

I am going to go with 1.3 per 10g. I read that you can go 1.5, but I would like to keep it smaller while having more than 2 females per colony.
So the wood-pellet bedding works better with mice? I used it with rats but hated to see their big poops everywhere (as they did not get "buried" into the bedding like when I use shavings.) But I guess this would not be an issue with little-turded mice?

We are using the wood pellet bedding as well. So far (day two) it only smells like wood like for the fire) I'm going with a 1.3 group eventually. For now we are running a trial breeding with 1.1.

Sounds good. I want to avoid certain wood-stove pellets though, because they are chemically treated?

If you can get it conveniently, get the big bags (40lb) of Woody Pet. Here, it's cheaper than the wood stove pellets, and is intended for use with animals. If wood stove pellets are all you have then just ask if it's chemically treated or not... I believe most of them are just compressed pine, though I've heard of some being made of hardwoods too.

As far as your colony... Right now I'm on my second generation of harem breeding mice. My colonies are 1.3 (except for my original 1.2) and stay together 100% of the time. They're all so calm, I can mess with the babies to my heart's content and nobody gets upset. I personally feel that the breedable life of a female mouse is so short that, though it may be slightly more difficult on them physically, keeping them together for 5-6 breedings, then switching the females out, is the best, most reliable method to do it.

I got a male today.. but I am planning on creating my colony on monday, after I can get to another store to buy 2 more females. I will just put the male in a holding tank, and keep the female in her tank after I feed her babies off tomorrow to the BP hatchlings. Wow; the BPs are already ready to eat an almost full-grown mouse! They grow fast. I will love it when I can let the rats/mice that I breed, grow more and not need to buy so many feeders for my larger snakes.. but the window of time that hatchlings are small, is not that bad, and I am glad I know what to expect in the feeder department now.

Personally now that we have the asf's I would never breed mice again they are dirty smelly and we never seem to get them to breed and if we do they eat their babies.If you are just looking for a smaller prey item at least for any snakes your keeping I would suggest the asf we are seeing really good feeding response with many of the snakes we have introduced them to. Our two wild caughts are so happy lol an Ri our size specific snake loves them no more having to pick thru the rats to find just the perfect size pup or weanling to get her to eat.

I really specialize in the rats (regular rats.) After tomorrow, I will only have 4 smaller BPs to feed (hatched in August.) 2 are bought and hopefilly getting shipped out this week. That'll just leave me with my 2 holdbacks, and they are almost on adult mouse-sized meals.
I do not mind the mice when kept in the pellet bedding. I noticed that the thing that seems to make any cage reek (rat or mouse) is spilled water. I tended to use water dishes with the mice because I ran out of bottles (all the rats were using them.) The spilt water created nasty sopping shavings on one end of the mouse tank that were made worse by the mouse urine. By either overbedding with shavings, or using the pellets, the smell is not bad. I have them in a seperate room that people do not really go in so the slight odor is not too bad.

Nasty wet pellets smell SOOOOO terrible. Just terrible. :(

I have not noticed that they smell bad. The brand I am using is Equine Pine, and it just turns into a sawdust-like material when wet.

I've been trying different wood pellets, not just ones for bedding, and the equine fresh is by far the king of clean.
We've tried pelleted newspaper (cellsorb) =Stinks to much, doesn't soak very well, but great for allergy control;
Generic wood pellet fuel (soft woods) = Breaks down well, very aromatic wood smell, dusty in bag, smelly when wet; and
American Wood Fibers Pellet fuel (Hardwood) =No strong aromatic smell, less dusty, breaks down readily and soaks well, but dang does it smell when soaked! We had a jammed spout here couple weeks ago, and that stuff sure does stink when wet.

Equine Fresh worked the best for odor control, it's less dusty, and incredibly absorbent. I will be sticking with it unless I see some other bedding I should try out.