To breed or not to breed

I keep 1.3 in a 40 breeder now. I'm gonna put the male in a 40 breeder with another male tto keep him company. When I know the females are preggy, I usually just feed off the male but I'm going to start keeping him in his own tank. Having 2 boas, its easier for me to breed rats. It gets expensive buying XXL rats every 1-2 weeks at petstores for primary food source. Its easier and cheaper to supplement them with retired breeders instead of solely f/t. Not to meantion it gets expensive buying 10-20 lbs of rats every 2-3 months.

For those that breed mice, how do you give them water? whenever i have excess mice from the petstore i just give them small water dishes. It is annoying replacing those and they seem to tip them them over alot. I tryed useing a small water bottle and put an upside down bowl so they could get to it...but they didnt drink from it.

If the water dishes are round, go to home depot with one of them and look at the PVC pipe and buy the correct size and cut it like a ring to put on the bottom of it. This should keep the dish from tipping.

Bowls are not good for mice - even if they don't tip them over - they fill them up with their bedding. I tried bowls for awhile and finally got them a water bottle.

Bowls are terrible for water, water bottles are much better and I've never had a rodent that didn't learn to drink from one. The only problem I've had is with them climbing to the top of the water bottle and chewing holes in them which causes all the water to drip out. I got around this by cutting the top off of a red bull can, turning it over and putting it over the water bottle like a sleeve.

Mark

Look for the tiniest sized water bottles or ask at your local pet store for water bottles that they use with their store mice stock. When you fill it and hook it up, tap the ball and a drip of water will come out. They'll smell that and if thirsty will pretty quickly figure it out.

Jason, that male rat wouldn't have been a good candidate for breeding anyway. He's a high-white and could be carrying megacolon. He has a lightning blaze and is a husky. Both of which don't help his case. Sorry he turned out to be nutso, but it was probably for the best as who knows what he could have passed to his offspring. The professional breeders in the rat fancy have been trying very hard for YEARS to get megacolon out of lines. It's really best to breed rats that are selfs(only one color), hoodeds, berkshires/irish/english irish, siamese,russian blue point(any color points) and capped. Any rat with markings differing from that or more white than color, shouldn't be bred. We're trying to better the species, not hinder it. Breeding rats that are high white, that results in megacolon babies, and not ever breeding any of the rats from those lines again would be the best possible outcome. Megacolon just spreads like wildfire and it's preferred to just stop it in its tracks by not breeding rats such as yours(especially for feeder purposes as who knows who may get ahold of those rats, and if they carry MC, it will just keep spreading).

And yes, water bottles are the best possible way of providing water. I wouldn't use any other method as it is just unsanitary and gross. I recently went to Petsmart and found tons of 32oz water bottles for $1 apiece. They are the good kind(Lixit) and do not leak. I keep my mice in lab cages right now, but once I move them to my house for the winter, they will be moved back into 10-g and 20-g long tanks. Haven't ever had problems with chewed water bottles, but I do give them tons of other stuff to chew such as kleenex boxes, thick cardboard tubes(from WalMart's photo place-the printing paper comes on them), paper towels and the rolls, etc.

Hope that helps.

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Originally Posted by SatanicIntention

Jason, that male rat wouldn't have been a good candidate for breeding anyway. He's a high-white and could be carrying megacolon. He has a lightning blaze and is a husky. Both of which don't help his case. Sorry he turned out to be nutso, but it was probably for the best as who knows what he could have passed to his offspring. The professional breeders in the rat fancy have been trying very hard for YEARS to get megacolon out of lines. It's really best to breed rats that are selfs(only one color), hoodeds, berkshires/irish/english irish, siamese,russian blue point(any color points) and capped. Any rat with markings differing from that or more white than color, shouldn't be bred. We're trying to better the species, not hinder it. Breeding rats that are high white, that results in megacolon babies, and not ever breeding any of the rats from those lines again would be the best possible outcome. Megacolon just spreads like wildfire and it's preferred to just stop it in its tracks by not breeding rats such as yours(especially for feeder purposes as who knows who may get ahold of those rats, and if they carry MC, it will just keep spreading).

Hope that helps.

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Becky,

I believe we had that discussion when I posted the pictures of my rats a while ago:) , however still great prevalent information for anyone else looking for breeders! I was going to breed him to hooded females to lessen the possibility of spreading possible MC gene to any offspring, it probably was for the best however that he went crazy.

For my future colony, I want to work with hoodeds, black selfs, blues, keeping it low white this time around....but I first need to get a rack built and get them set up right.
As always, great information Becky! Local BPnet Rat guru!:salute:

-Jason

What in the heck is megacolon? I've never heard of it. Some kind of a rat disease? Or condition?

It sounds like it could be used as a descriptive term for some people I know..... :D

Here's a good read on Megacolon that should sum things up much better than I can describe.

http://ratguide.com/health/digestive/megacolon.php

-Jason