Okay I'm a Big Weenie Too

Our little mouse breeding operation is a dud so far. The cute little black and white male mouse just never seemed to do anything so last night we fed him off. I know it was "only" a mouse and never a pet but dang we felt a bit bad about doing that. Silly eh?

On the upside while looking through the feeder tanks at the pet store we found two obviously pregnant female mice (both albinos) and picked out a very nice male mouse (another albino but at this point I'll take anything...I'm tired of buying mice!). The two females are in their own tank together and the male mouse went in with our original three females. He immediately went to work (so to speak) and there was much jumping about and squeeking. We never did see the black and white male doing anything with the females so hopefully this new male will get the job done.

I'm hoping the two pregnant females will deliver and care for their litters. I assume it's okay to keep them together at this point, let them raise their litters and then at some point put all 5 females in with the male or should I wait and get them their own male once they wean their current litters? I don't want the three females from the one mouse group to fight with the two from the other group.

mice do way better in pairs when they birth jo. so i would keep them together.

when i did breed mice years ago. i used a group of a few males and just moved them from tank to tank. each tank holding 1-3 females and i had no problems breeding at all.

when i tried to breed last year... i left the male in with the females and never had any luck at all. :( so i don't know why i couldn't seem to get any litters. seems like it was easy when i did it before. i have about 25 tanks of females... and bred mice like crazy (for an owl sanctuary).

best of luck to you and your mice!

Well I tried breeding mice ages ago way before I bred rats Aleesha and it was a bust then too. The females back then just ate their litters! Hopefully this time will go better and hopefully this white male mouse will do his thing. I don't want to come off mean or impatient but neither do I want to run a home for sexually dysfunctional rodents LOL. Geeze all they have to do in life is eat, drink and make...merry...you think this is too much to ask! The rats sure seem to enjoy this lifestyle...you'd think the mice would clue in that's it's a pretty good deal...geesh! :confused:

:giggle: i agree... what's up with them?

i'm sending mouse-sex vibes your way jo

No luck here breeding mice. The males showed no interested. I have read on a few sites that say it is best to cycle the male in and out.

I'm sending positive so-I-bought-a-pregnant-mouse-I-hope-she-gives-birth-okay vibes your way!

On my mousey front, I think Miss Mouse, my albino girlie, is finally pregnant, but I'm gonna wait just a little longer before feeding off her boyfriend...and I euth'ed and froze all of Cookie's babies except the cute black silky boy to keep as a hopefully good stud male....

I like makin'em and Jenson likes eatin'em...we have a symbiotic relationship. :D

I'd like to point out that albino males seem to be more prolific breeders than colored males. Just an observance I've had from breeding my own mice/rats for several years.

Gah, I'm getting frustrated, myself. My male has no problems with breeding, but I've only gotten 2 full litters and 2 babies out of 2 other litters raised to feeding size. The females keep killing the babies, and it's driving me mad. I plan on grilling Becky about it tomorrow, as I'm just at my limit at this point.
I had 3 pregnant females when Becky was at my house, all 3 have deliveres, and all 3 killed the babies.
I'm seriously thinking about switching to rats as I've heard they are better parents. Is that true?

What I've gotten from Kara, info wise, is that if you keep them in bigger groups, say 1.7-1.9, they do much better and are more prolific. Once I get my mouse rack built, I plan on having either big cat litter pans or those cement mixing tubs with 1.8 in each and see how it goes. I barely mess with mine, maybe once a week to a week and a half. They get fed Mazuri Rodent 9F, and are on kiln dried pine shavings. If I have to move mice around, such as if females are getting older or the males aren't doing their job, I just do it all in one day. Move everyone out, clean the tank and acessories, and move everyone back in. I rarely have eaten babies. Sometimes I do cover their tanks with dark towels just in case.

Ok, well I will try that, then. I guess my colony is just too small. I don't know what else to do at this point!

If by killing you mean eating, maybe you should feed them more? I have no clue just thought I'd throw that one up and see what happens. :P :P

I hope that you have luck in mouse breeding.. I myself have two in a 10g tank though I hate mice and much prefer my ratties.. but they are very profitable to sell to my local pet store (the mice) so I am giving it a whirl.

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Originally Posted by SarahMB

I'm seriously thinking about switching to rats as I've heard they are better parents. Is that true?

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Way better parents! I've had little to no success breeding mice in two attempts at it. The rats...put a healthy male and a healthy, good sized female together and bingo...you pretty much are guaranteed a nice litter of feeders. Most female rats are excellent with their litters. I think I've only had maybe 2 females that I had to cull out for poor mothering skills. Even the males are quite good with their offspring. It's pretty rare to have a rat cannabalize her litter unless she's ill, the offspring are ill or something is really really bad. I wouldn't even bother with having mice except we have a few snakes here that won't take rats and I'm tired of the inconvenience of running to the pet store each week.

Hmmm, I might have to pick up a pair and give it a go! :)

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Originally Posted by Phreak

If by killing you mean eating, maybe you should feed them more? I have no clue just thought I'd throw that one up and see what happens. :P :P

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Matt I don't believe most mice kill and/or consume their young due to being hungry, at least not in the case of most folks here and their mouse breeding attempts. It seems to be related to first time breeders, stress, whatever, just seems far more prevalent with mice for some reason.

Sarah, you'll probably enjoy rat breeding. It's really quite easy, rats have little to no natural odor, happily help you clean up your dinner leftovers, are quite easy to hand tame so you don't get nipped much and generally if kept well regularily produce lovely litters of feeders with very little hassle or problems.

If your mice are eating your babies try feeding more protein. I found that mine required a little more protein than the mazuri I was feeding them. I did this by adding some high protein dry dog food to the mix.. no more eating babies after that

give it a try, it may help..