Planning on first pairing: Opinions on conformation?

Good points!
Sorraia- I kinda see my rats that way. I want to breed them mainly to improve on their health and temperament and make them better "pets" for my own enjoyment and possibly to sell as such, if there's a market for them here, but while doing so, I will also be using the ones that don't "make the cut" so to speak, to feed my snakes. I am going slow at first to see how things go, but would ideally like to have a colony that will sustain my reptile hobby (I only have 6 snakes, so it wouldn't need to be a large number of rats) and also produce consistently good pet animals with few or no health issues. I think rats make excellent small pets, but have also seen first hand the results of bad temperament and unsocialized animals... I consider myself lucky to have gotten two males with passable temperaments that weren't socialized (from the feeder bin at petco). I am planning on not placing any of the rats I produce as pets until at least the second or third generation so that I can be sure of their temperament as adults.

Too bad you weren't closer. Or would be nice to have local people with similar goals to work together! ;)

God, I can just imagine the backlash you would get on said rat forum if they heard about feeding the ones who didn't make the cut to snakes. I think it's a wonderful thing to do - the snakes need to eat, right? It addresses not only the issue of having too many rats, or getting things you didn't want from the breeding, but it also helps give you the best selection to choose from for breeding without having to worry about homing the ones that don't make the breeder's cut. I think it's a win win.

Oh, but how dare you do something like that. You bad, bad person you.

On a similar tangent, you should read the comments on YouTube on the videos of people feeding rats to snakes. Some of the things those people say make my jaw drop.

I also didn't know rat shows were a thing. That's awesome.

Why do you think there is no show world for ball pythons? They're a popular pet and come in tons of colors. Is it because of everyone being afraid of incurable diseases like IBD?

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Originally Posted by salt

I also didn't know rat shows were a thing. That's awesome.

Why do you think there is no show world for ball pythons? They're a popular pet and come in tons of colors. Is it because of everyone being afraid of incurable diseases like IBD?

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Probably because no one has done it, or just doesn't want to. The disease concerns haven't stopped people from going to expos to sell their snakes. Also there are similar disease concerns for rats,but that doesn't stop people from showing them.

I also have experience with the rat forum. I think they are a little high strung. I wanted to start out with good quality breeder rats, but like you, most breeders require a no breeding contract. I find this to be completely silly. I managed to find a friend who breeds feeder rats and picked up a few babies from her. One in particular I have hand raised and she is the sweetest baby (she is now a pet and will not be used for breeding or food ). The other ones I got at a later time and they are terrified of me. She didn't handle them for obvious reasons and I feel I'm at an obvious disadvantage now. I plan on breeding the females for a litter or two ( choosing a few females from their babies and hand raising them) and then use the mothers for snake food. I hope to use the babies for snake food, and then whatever is left over, sell for pets. I love rats and I love snakes. It's just a sad fact of life that snakes eat rats. My goal is create rat babies with good temperaments ( it really seems that the temperament isn't "passed down", it's how they are raised and handled). I also want the babies to have the best lives while they are with me. I wish you a ton of luck with breeding. Maybe post some pics of your rat babies when you can?

Glad to know there are more people interested in this topic. It would be great to have a community of feeder breeders that also breed for quality.

I will definitely post pics... The females never hold still, so hard to get pics and I haven't been able to find my good camera since I moved. I will document the pregnancy and babies. I am hoping to get feedback on the babies when they are old enough to pick my keepers. I've read that 6 weeks is a good time to choose, but don't really know what to look for. It is likely that my first generation will all be black with various markings, and all should be recessive for blue and dumbo, so we'll see. In a couple months, i plan to do a second breeding with buttercup's sister and the same male, so that will yield similar offspring.

I think that temperament has both a genetic and socialization component. I am planning on weeding out any aggressive rats, if any are produced from the breedings. I am starting with adults that have good temperaments, so hopefully this won't be an issue. Ideally, I'd love to place the rats that don't suit my needs as pets, but I just don't think there's a market here. There are NO breeders in my area and I was lucky to find the person that I will get babies from... She doesn't even live in my city.

I think breeding rats is more popular in the north east and in california for some reason, but there are practically no clubs or any interest here in the south east. I'd love to be closer to those with similar things in mind. I was hoping to find new stock at the reptile show in Atlanta (the closest to me at 2 hours away) but only found one person selling true feeder rats.. not socialized and not in very clean conditions).

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Originally Posted by sorraia

Too bad you weren't closer. Or would be nice to have local people with similar goals to work together! ;)

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I would love to work with you sometime! Maybe not too soon due to a few life issues(mostly revolving around my strabismus treatment eating my funds and my sister with down syndrome taking up a lot of my free time), but maybe sometime in the next year :)

A bunch of people asked me for pet rats a while ago, so I had one litter of pet rats as an experiment to see how I would enjoy it with all the added responsibility... and I REALLY enjoyed it. So, I retired ALL of my rats I got from pet stores and picked up some rats from ratteries in Northern California(one even has a pedigree from Jozzy's Rat Pack) during the rat show last month to start my own lines. I also started up a rattery website mostly to document my own breeding, while using it to sell a few babies I've worked with but don't find match up to my standards and really don't want them to be feeders. I wouldn't consider myself a real rattery though, it's just nice for people to have a place they can go to when they need to contact me ^^

I still have your guys going and I absolutely love them! After having pet store animals in my feeder stock for a while, I learned what a bad rat was. Even though they weren't aggressive, they were not easy to handle and would jump or escape while I had the tubs open. They made some damn cute rats, but I didn't like how non-relaxed they were compared to the ones I got from you. I kept close track of who bred to who, so it was easy for me to eliminate guys with parents whom I didn't like.

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Originally Posted by sorraia

Probably because no one has done it, or just doesn't want to. The disease concerns haven't stopped people from going to expos to sell their snakes. Also there are similar disease concerns for rats,but that doesn't stop people from showing them.

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Last time I tried to suggest a BP show, people lost their minds and a flame war started. :rolleyes:

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Originally Posted by Rhasputin

Last time I tried to suggest a BP show, people lost their minds and a flame war started. :rolleyes:

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That happens when anyone suggests anything, for the most part. :|


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