A Rat Colony When You Have Little Space...

Robin has been talking with me about building her rat colony but having a lot of space constraints and since I faced that for a long time (having no basement or big spare room) I thought I'd share a bit about how I dealt with this issue. I choose to not use the more traditional rat racks as I like a bit more interaction with my permanent breeder rats.

This is the original rat rack I had. I actually had two maternity tanks side by side. The bottom cage was Casanova's and where he lived permanently and the four females I had back then cycled in and out with him. Above was 2 ten gallon glass maternity tanks and above that two feeder bins. It was just a little start but it really helped feed our snakes back then (of course we had a lot less snakes then come to think of it LOL). It wasn't a big start but it quickly cut back on our $100 a month feeding bill from the local pet store.

http://i41.photobucket.com/albums/e2.../RatRack-1.jpg

This free standing plastic rack is from WalMart and retails for around $18.00, snaps together without any tools needed and is super easy to keep clean. It's dimensions are 33.5 wide x 14 deep x 55 high (68 high with top tank). I've had this same rack in service for over 2 years now and it's never even developed a crack.

Here's the same rack today. It's currently housing 5 females and their 35 offspring of various ages (some litters are mostly fed off as I need a lot of fuzzies and pups right now). It can easily hold 7 ten gallon tanks though I never put 2 on top as it is a lighter duty rack so I don't trust it being too top heavy.

http://i41.photobucket.com/albums/e2...rnityTanks.jpg

A very small footprint really for the numbers it can hold.

I combine this rack with 4 large tubs that I get from the local dollar store for about $7.00 per tub (plus of course the cost of hardware cloth to ventilate).

Hardware cloth (about $7.00 for a good sized roll)....

http://i41.photobucket.com/albums/e2...ClothLabel.jpg

Here's our breeding tub currently housing 1 male and 2 females....

http://i41.photobucket.com/albums/e2...ubSideView.jpg

One of the feeder/grower tubs (side view)....

http://i41.photobucket.com/albums/e2...ubSideView.jpg

Same tub (top view)....
http://i41.photobucket.com/albums/e2...TubTopView.jpg

These bigger tubs are 19 wide x 32.5 long x 13.5 high. The tubs that actually fit the rack (pictured in the first rack) are 16 wide x 24 long x 12 high.

When I figured it out for Robin I came to this conclusion. If you had two of these racks side by side they barely take up the room an entertainment unit would.

You could easily house the following in this relatively small space...

Rack 1:
4 maternity tanks (2 side by side on the bottom two shelves)
1 tub for breeders on the next shelf
1 spare/overflow tub on the top shelf

Rack 2:
2 maternity tanks side by side on the bottom shelf
1 tub for female feeders above that
1 tub for male feeders above that
1 tub for resting females on the top shelf

This gives you quite a lot of bang for a pretty small space buck. You could have a nice working colony of 1 or 2 males and up to 6 or 8 females and you should have enough tanks/tubs to cycle it quite nicely if you plan the breedings out carefully.

Considering Robin doesn't need anything larger than a small/small rat and will likely feed off quite a few large pups/weanlings sizes, she shouldn't run into overcrowding issues but that's why I built the overflow/spare tub into the plan (I believe in having a backup tub at all times just in case).

Hope this was what you needed Robin and it's of interest to the smaller rat colony breeder that doesn't have the ability to spread out in a basement or garage but would still like to breed for the needs of their snakes.

Oh and just for fun! Here's a shot of old Casanova enjoying his retirement. He might be an old 2 year plus rat but he's still King of the Food Dish! LOL

http://i41.photobucket.com/albums/e2...ovatheboys.jpg

very cool jo. i've been using something quite similar and it does work very well and takes up little space.

one word of advice though on putting two plastic tubs (aquariums would be fine because of their weight) vertically into the rack side by side--if the tubs overhang the shelves much at all on either end your rats will find a way to somehow make it fall off the rack. :o i put two tubs like that as a test one time and as i sitting on the floor cleaning the tubs below the boogers in one of the vertical tubs managed to make this happen, which resulted in their tub falling on my head, the top flying off, covering me in aspen, water, food and freaked out rats. fun! they must have all run to the edge and jumped up and down or something--i have no idea--but i quickly decided that that wasn't going to be a good idea. :stupidme:

That's a good point Emily and exactly why I only allow one plastic tub sideways per shelf. I too tried to put two side by side and found that they overhang too much and to get two plastic tubs to fit on that rack dimension, they are simply too small too be of any real use other than maternity tubs. That's why I went with a combination of plastic tubs and glass tanks and keep the tanks low on the rack to keep it balanced weightwise.

what a GREAT post jo. thanks so much. that really helps me with my "where am i gonna put all these tubs" situation we are just about to start aquiring.

;) and i love that you can still see and interact with your rats. our breeders are also our pets... so we want to hold them and hand feed them and play with them... the only thing i don't like about your design... if the lack of hammocks. we are a 'havetohavehammocks' colony... even the mamas love to retire to their hammock when they don't need to sit on their pups... so i think... a mesh on the top with large enough squares that we can clip a closepin onto it (to hold up each of the four corners of our hammocks) would make this absolute perfection for our colony!!!

Thank you Joanna! That really does help a LOT!

just a note: i have seen some shelving units at lowe's that are very similar, about the same length and height (they are black as opposed to white though) but that have deeper shelves--i haven't measured but i think that they might just do the trick for keeping two tubs per shelf. :)

I designed a rat rack that would work well for small spaces/ people who want to interact/dont have much room.

It is 2' wide 2' deep and 4' or 6' tall. Using primarly wood, scratch/chew resistant whiteboard, and hardware cloth. The 6' tall version (mainly to conserve space) will have 6 levels about 8-10" tall, room for food to be placed on top of the racks for auto feeding, a hinged wood/HW cloth door with removeable dividers on aluminum rails.

That leaves the option of having 6 spots that are 2'x2' or dividing them up for mothers to have 1'x2' sections to themselves.

I am building myself a 4'wide and 6' tall version at the moment and will post pics when I do :).


This is a great post, good job jo!

Sticky worthy, my friend, sticky worthy. This will definitely help a lot of people!

That's about what I'm doing, tubs on a utility type shelf unit. Only I've gone the lazy route and built in a food/water holders that hang from the lid.

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Originally Posted by recycling goddess

what a GREAT post jo. thanks so much. that really helps me with my "where am i gonna put all these tubs" situation we are just about to start aquiring.

;) and i love that you can still see and interact with your rats. our breeders are also our pets... so we want to hold them and hand feed them and play with them... the only thing i don't like about your design... if the lack of hammocks. we are a 'havetohavehammocks' colony... even the mamas love to retire to their hammock when they don't need to sit on their pups... so i think... a mesh on the top with large enough squares that we can clip a closepin onto it (to hold up each of the four corners of our hammocks) would make this absolute perfection for our colony!!!

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You may have to find something other than clothespins Aleesha as I'd worry about doing to any larger mesh. I know my young weanlings can easily jump straight up and will happily hang from this mesh. I'd worry that they'd start to shove their faces into larger mesh and possibly get caught up a bit in it. I'm sure there's something that would hold your hammocks using this mesh size....just haven't had enough coffee to think of what that is yet this morning LOL. I don't personally use hammocks as my colony chewed through them so quickly and I've reached enough numbers that replacing them constantly just wasn't working for me anymore.

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Originally Posted by SnakeySnakeSnake

I designed a rat rack that would work well for small spaces/ people who want to interact/dont have much room.

It is 2' wide 2' deep and 4' or 6' tall. Using primarly wood, scratch/chew resistant whiteboard, and hardware cloth. The 6' tall version (mainly to conserve space) will have 6 levels about 8-10" tall, room for food to be placed on top of the racks for auto feeding, a hinged wood/HW cloth door with removeable dividers on aluminum rails.

That leaves the option of having 6 spots that are 2'x2' or dividing them up for mothers to have 1'x2' sections to themselves.

I am building myself a 4'wide and 6' tall version at the moment and will post pics when I do :).


This is a great post, good job jo!

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Love to see the pics Bryan when it's done. I'm not much of a builder at all so I needed to find something pre-made that would do the job, not cost me much money and be sturdy enough to last. These plastic kitchen storage shelves fit the bill for me. :)

Nice idea definately. Those shelving units are often on sale at the HDepot, and some that are even cheaper are sold as "garage shelving", made out of metal. I used to have those back in my old bedroom back home (they fit the decor, hehe) and they are nice and sturdy.

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Originally Posted by rabernet

Sticky worthy, my friend, sticky worthy. This will definitely help a lot of people!

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Thanks Robin. I hope it just gives an idea of different options or somewhere to start small when you basically are living with your rats or want them as pets as well as providing top quality feeders for your snake collection.

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Originally Posted by frankykeno

Love to see the pics Bryan when it's done. I'm not much of a builder at all so I needed to find something pre-made that would do the job, not cost me much money and be sturdy enough to last. These plastic kitchen storage shelves fit the bill for me. :)

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I agree, I started with some shelves but then decided to try carpentry

First (small) rat rack storage

https://ball-pythons.net/gallery/fil...oneRatRack.jpg

I ended up tearing these down because the simple storage shelves from Walmart were better :)

One thing I didn't mention is the supplies to make a rat tub for this type of plastic rack. You need a tub of the dimensions mentioned in the my first post, you need some of the 1/2" hardware cloth, a bag of the heavier grade zipties and something to either cut or melt out a large rectangle from the lid of the tub. Make sure you get tubs that have good tight fitting lids with those snap down clips at each end (nobody needs an escapee rat lol). You should be able to find the rolls of hardware cloth at Home Depot or Lowe's in the fencing or garden departments for about 5 to 7 dollars. Don't use chickenwire, rats can chew through that in a heartbeat. Use 1/4" hardware cloth if you are raising mice instead of rats. All the ventilation comes from this cut out lid. I used to put some extra ventilation in the sides but any hole is an invitation to chew so I stopped that fast. I only melt three holes now. One for the spigot of the water bottle (just barely big enough to feed that through into the tank) and two small ones to run a piece of wire to hold the bottle upright. If you find the rats are chewing around the water bottle spigot just put a square of hardware cloth over that area and they tend to give up pretty fast. One of our members did a nice pictorial awhile back on making a plastic rat tub but darned if I can find it right now to link it to this thread.

awesome post, i was looking into finding something similar for our pets :D thanks

http://warrenreptiles.com/gallery/ma...serialNumber=2

More here: http://warrenreptiles.com/gallery/ma...?g2_itemId=412

how do you put the screen in the top of the lids??? can we post pics of that and how you do it, what product are you using also

well for pics you will have to wait for jo to take or post them.As for how wee get the mesh into the center of the tubs it's really pretty easy. first you need a soddering iron, a razor knife box cutter etc, the mesh or hardware cloth and some zip ties. then you measure out the area you are going to remove I draw out the whole rectangle the lines keep me on track. Then you remove it by first using the soddering iron to get a hole into which you can fit your cutting tool then you just follow the lines and remove the plastic piece. Place the piece of hardware cloth mesh you have cut making shure it over laps the edge of the hole by at least to or three squares all aroud. The using the soddering iron you put two holes one on eitherside of one of the bars in the mesh and secrue it down with a zip tie, use as many as necessary so that the mesh cant be easily forced up as they don't need much space to esacpe. hope this helps.

that was a perfect explination.. thanks!!!!! Definetly worth a try, is the mesh something you can buy anywhere (Walmart) or is it at homedepot

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Originally Posted by AshleyB

that was a perfect explination.. thanks!!!!! Definetly worth a try, is the mesh something you can buy anywhere (Walmart) or is it at homedepot

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You can buy hardware cloth at lowes and home depot this is what I also use for the homemade rack I made.

If you don't mind spending a little more, Big Apple now has lab breeder bins for like $45 bucks for their largest size. I picked up a few of those, myself. It just seemed like it was worth the reduction in my effort to get them. If you aren't familiar with them, they have a very tough plastic tub with a metal grate over the top. On one end is an inverted triangle. One half of this triangle holds a water bottle, (or two, in the largest bins), and the other half holds the lab blocks. The rodents reach up and chew the blocks through the wire, so they aren't sitting down in their cage where they can soil the blocks or get them wet. When it comes time to clean, you just unlatch and lift off the wire top, food and all, remove the rats, dump and wipe out the plastic bin, replace everything, and you're all set. I have dealt with glass tanks, AND tried the sterilite bin cages...the glass are horribly heavy and a pain to clean, and the regular plastic bins eventually get chewed. I also had problems with the water bottles leaking. (It's very important to make sure that your water bottle sits at the correct angle when you attach it to the side of one of those big tubs)

Wow, I couldnt imagine spending 40 bucks for one bin... LOL, I like my rats, but not THAT much.:D I prefer the diy rack.

Wow, what a post. I am new to this site. New to reptiles, have 3 snakes, and I live in a remote area. So, I have been thinking of raising some rats for convenience more than anything. They appear to make great pets which is a bonus. I live in the country, on 5 acres, with out buildings so room is not a problem, but convenience is. This type of set up seems to fit the bill. Again, great post,

Mike

forgive me if this has been already asked how did you secure the hardware screen thin to the lids

Thank you for a great post! I have been considering breeding my own rats and I have very limited space where I am currently at. This has helped me immesnely!

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Originally Posted by derrabe

forgive me if this has been already asked how did you secure the hardware screen thin to the lids

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You can either use heavy plastic zip ties (clip off the spare end once it's tight) or you can use flexible wire to weave in and out of the hardware cloth. To make the holes to do this I use a very simple and inexpensive soldering wand (WalMart $6.00).

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Originally Posted by python1024

Thank you for a great post! I have been considering breeding my own rats and I have very limited space where I am currently at. This has helped me immesnely!

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Glad this thread has been so useful. It was fun for me today to go back and look at what I used to do. These days with so many more snakes to feed I have to have a lot more rodents. Funny thing is though that $17.00 plastic white rack is STILL in use today. Best $17.00 I've ever spent LOL.

I'm working on a design for a small scale breeding set up for people that want to get everything up and running. I am still trying to find tubs that make the grow out rack cost effective to build, but I will find them LOL.

I am building my breeding racks now out of Home Depot mixing tubs (27" x 19.75" x 6"). I make the racks four levels high and two levels wide for a total of eight tubs. I have been running 1.3 females in these tubs because the birthing rack I made holds 24 tubs.

The birthing rack is made using medium (16" x 12" x 4") petmate litter pans. These are built four tubs wide and six levels tall.

This design keeps the overall height of the rack low and manageable and allows you to keep 24 females running. You will produce 100-120 rats per month in this set up.

I don't have the perfect grow out racks done yet, but I am guessing that they are going to end up being the large mixing tubs from Home Depot (36" x 30" x 8"). I stole the hopper design from Freedom Breeder, and I am trying to figure out the water now.

I have found a few flaws in this design. I have been able to redesign it every time to salvage them. This design definantly gets an A+, but come payday, I will be posting up some pics of my new design. I recently had a female gnaw through the top corner of a tub, I managed to salvage the tub and build around it, but I have something new in the works. I will keep you posted.

I went out and bought the rack from walmart around 18 bucks. It is a bit flimsy before its put together. but it holds my tubs pretty well. I am using 50 qt tubs with hardware cloth on the middle of the lids and I currently can hold 6-8 50 qt tubs. Depending if i want birthing tubs included on the top. Its working really well for me. the only negative is i have to take the water bottles of when i need to move the tubs. Oh and its by my bed and the rats make a lot of noise lol (yay poor college student) but thats not the racks fault. Anyways thanks for the post!

I know this is an older post, but I just wanted to make a suggestion on the lid for anyone using these type of tubs. I always put the wire on the inside of the lid, not the outside. I think that the rats would be less likely to try and chew the lid this way. So far it has worked for me.

http://i1104.photobucket.com/albums/...ps40ba95d4.jpg

http://i1104.photobucket.com/albums/...psd335e151.jpg

http://i1104.photobucket.com/albums/...pse241ec29.jpg

http://i1104.photobucket.com/albums/...ps5c89621d.jpg
Just sharing

Wish this showed the pictures

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This is my start up setup:
http://i161.photobucket.com/albums/t...ps1f127d4f.jpg

Dnkreptiles: AMAZING set up.. love it.. i'm just getting started and my dad is making me a rack out of angle iron.. so we'll see.. :)

PS: i know this is an older post..

I am having issues where,my RATS aren't breeding and some people are saying it may be they need more. Heat. They are in the same room as my snakes and dogs. I have a 40 gal aquarium with my make RATS in and my females I have in 10 gallons on a per tank. When they were breeding I would keep the two in the tank until they were ready to drop them separated them to 1 mom with babies per 10 gal aquarium.I have been swapping a make out with my females every couple days and I haven't seen them mating and the moms don't seem to be getting pregnant. What would you suggest because I have 27ball pythons varying in many sizes and need Pups to med RATS to feed, and that gets quite expensive. Do you have any suggestions. They would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.

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Originally Posted by RNBOWJESTER76

I am having issues where,my RATS aren't breeding and some people are saying it may be they need more. Heat. They are in the same room as my snakes and dogs. I have a 40 gal aquarium with my make RATS in and my females I have in 10 gallons on a per tank. When they were breeding I would keep the two in the tank until they were ready to drop them separated them to 1 mom with babies per 10 gal aquarium.I have been swapping a make out with my females every couple days and I haven't seen them mating and the moms don't seem to be getting pregnant. What would you suggest because I have 27ball pythons varying in many sizes and need Pups to med RATS to feed, and that gets quite expensive. Do you have any suggestions. They would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.

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My suggestion rather than bumping an 11 years old post (in which many members have not participated in years) would be to create your own thread in the appropriate forum :gj:

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Originally Posted by ss10gotanks

I went out and bought the rack from walmart around 18 bucks. It is a bit flimsy before its put together. but it holds my tubs pretty well. I am using 50 qt tubs with hardware cloth on the middle of the lids and I currently can hold 6-8 50 qt tubs. Depending if i want birthing tubs included on the top. Its working really well for me. the only negative is i have to take the water bottles of when i need to move the tubs. Oh and its by my bed and the rats make a lot of noise lol (yay poor college student) but thats not the racks fault. Anyways thanks for the post!

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What rack? Any way to share photos or a link?

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Is it possible to update the photos on the OP so they're visible? Thanks.

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Originally Posted by BreezyB

What rack? Any way to share photos or a link?

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Is it possible to update the photos on the OP so they're visible? Thanks.

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Unlikely. This thread is 15yrs old and the OP hasn’t logged on in 11yrs


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