Massive rat die off - No idea what the cause is.

The Petsmart website is referring to how much to mix to treat fish tanks. The only time I ever used it I used 1 pack to each 20oz bottle. 1 packet per 16-20oz is a whole lot different than one packet to 1280oz (or one packet to 128oz if you meant using all ten packets in the box to treat ten gallons). You have to mix it a little stronger for usage as a rat drink vs a fishs water.

Sorry that this happened to you. Just for the sake of a post mortem (no pun intended) analysis so this becomes a learning experience for others - please don't read this in a tone of finger wagging. That is not my intent:

Make sure you quarantine new additions to any collection for an extended period of time. I'm of the opinion that if you inbreed until genetic complications work themselves out of your colony, that this is much safer than adding new blood from the vast majority of places you can buy rats. Any rat that sneezes frequently doesn't get babies held back; any rat that dies under 1 year old of tumors has the offspring carefully considered for retirement.

Lab rats are inbred purposely for 15? + generations before they are even considered a 'line'. Does this open up the possibility for them to be susceptible to a particular illness? Sure, but then again I keep my cages clean and uncrowded and don't introduce new blood, so the odds of such an illness entering my collection are low.

When I have to buy a feeder such as a mouse or a small rat if I have the wrong sizes at the time I am extremely sterile about where that animal is before it gets fed and what I do with all associated bedding, packaging, enclosures. Just like you would not pull a drooling ball out of a pile of babies at a pet store and throw it in with your most prized snake, I would not put a pet store or reptile rat breeder animal in with my rats now that I have an established, healthy, productive colony. When I do rarely add new blood I keep them in a different room and observe them for at least 2 months before integrating.

Anyway, good luck and I hope this never happens to you again!

I went and got some of the stuff I mixed 1/2 packet with a 8-9 oz water bottle we will see how the rats are doing when I get home tonight. How many times will I need to treat them????

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Originally Posted by strange

I went and got some of the stuff I mixed 1/2 packet with a 8-9 oz water bottle we will see how the rats are doing when I get home tonight. How many times will I need to treat them????

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It takes about 7-14 days to clear up if it's a minor/moderate infection.

Tetracycline is light sensitive, so cover up the water bottle with foil or something.
It breaks down otherwise.

Mix a new batch every 1-2 days.

Thanx everyone this forum I'd great my rats are doing great now not showing anymore signs and haven't had 1 rat die since I treated them... Thanx To everyone

Sorry to hear about you're loses. I believe my colony is going through a Mycoplasma flair up also. This morning I lost a female, she was showing the same symptoms - wheezing, sucked in sides, excess porphyrin and she refused to eat or drink. She was in the second week of nursing her pups. Good thing I had another female that had just weaned off her litter last week so I put her in there and she took over. I have another female showing the same symptoms also. She too also just finished weaning her litter last week. I think the stress from the litter and the bedding I had contributed to the mycoplasma flair up. The last bag of pine I had was a little dusty. I've read somewhere the phenols in pine inhibit the growth of micro-organisms which are absorbed through the respiratory tract. I switched to aspen and I'm going to the pet store tomorrow morning to purchase Tetracycline antibiotic powder and add it to the watering system. Makes me feel bad seeing them suffer like that and these are the first 2 girls that started my colony :(