Breed em, buy em, or both? Feeder source Poll~Please Vote

I buy live now. I used to buy bulk but have a few picky eaters that don't like F/T.

I think I will breed rats one day, but for now I don't have the patience to raise food. hehe

I do hate spending close to $100 bucks a month on snake food though.

I breed rats. I already had the males...my companions. Then, my brother was bringing in a small stock of young rats for me to try with my snakes (they'd never had rats before. these were free, decided we'd freeze them and try them). Well, little did I know, he also had two pregnant, a bit older, females dumped on him with the stock. So, naturally, they got dumped on me, too. They had their litters, which was more than enough food for 5 weeks...one of the younger ones got sat up with one of my companion males and will have her litter in about 2 weeks. I have some saved from the stock dump and they're getting big for my biggest boa, Marley. I use pre-killed for him. Haven't had to buy him a rat for 3 weeks, now. Got enough for at least another 3 weeks...if I absolutely HAVE TO, I will buy him a rat after that, until the others get big enough. But, I have means of getting another stock dump, I just haven't given the "ok," yet. Not enough space for another dump. Most of my cages/tubs are either in-use, or reserved. The two that are not in-use and don't have "names" on them are used strictly for housing sick animals.

My reason for breeding is because, it saves me alot of money. The stuff suggested to make a healthy rat food mix is mostly already stocked in my house, so I only need to spend about $20, tops, a month for unstocked items. With food, bedding, toys (yes, i give my rats toys to play with to keep them happy and active), treats; I spend about $40-$50 a month. I was spending roughly $200+ a month to keep my snakes fed. That was when I truly did not know the living conditions of the prey items, how and what they were fed, water quality, cleanliness of environment. Now, I have the security of knowing I am caring for the prey just like they are pets, they are fed a high-quality, nutritious diet, and are in a generally stress-free and extremely clean environment.

I buy my mice b/c I only have one snake for now. She won't eat f/t so I just started buying them once a week. When I get more (or when there are more snakes between Kasi and I) I'm going to breed rats, I think. Lilly will definately be on rats by then (she could switch over now if I could get them with out having to drive an hour) and any younger ones I may have can just start on the hoppers. But, after the bill of putting my truck in the shop, all of that is going to be a long ways off.....*dreams* Maybe I should get out of the dorms first too.... :P

I have been breeding rats for about a year now. I am OK at the planning/self sustaining part...With 40 mouths to feed weekly, buying rodents just wouldn't work for me. I have tried to start a mouse colony..but its been 5 weeks and so far all they do is kill each other/eat their young....I might just ramp up the rats and forget about the mice....

I do both.... :rolleyes: Hopefully I'll get to the point where I'm not buying Ratties, just a few mice for my mouse eaters and crickets for the ones with legs! :crix:

I buy new blood for the rat colony and thats all at this time with the 2-3 orders for XXL rats a year

I buy. I don't have time to breed, but I've tried it a few times with good success too. I might try it again, but I think the girl will throttle me. Who knows!?

Go for it, she'll start naming the rats before you know it!!

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Originally Posted by Jay_Bunny

At the moment, I buy, but plan on breeding when I get more snakes.

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X2!

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Originally Posted by tweets_4611

I buy my mice b/c I only have one snake for now. She won't eat f/t so I just started buying them once a week. When I get more (or when there are more snakes between Kasi and I) I'm going to breed rats, I think. Lilly will definately be on rats by then (she could switch over now if I could get them with out having to drive an hour) and any younger ones I may have can just start on the hoppers. But, after the bill of putting my truck in the shop, all of that is going to be a long ways off.....*dreams* Maybe I should get out of the dorms first too.... :P

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Shannon... I am not spending $2 per mouse at PetCo anymore.. I would be spending around $12 a week or more to keep my guys full. They are eating machines!!! You can have some of my pups, if I can have your firstborn....female BP that is :P