The good mixed with the bad.

I got a couple of 1.2 breeding groups finally considering no one had them around here a month or two ago. Group one dropped the first babies for me this Sunday. Today I come home to the male dead. The females are doing great and both are nursing the babies, cleaning and taking care of all 14. The second female will drop another litter any day now.
I am hoping they will be fine together which they appear to be getting along fine. The other thing I am wondering is should I hold a male back with the mothers or should I feed off this group once the babies are weaned?

I would hold back 3 females from the first litter, and one male from the second litter. That is your new breeding group. As soon as ALL the babies are weaned, feed off the moms.

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Originally Posted by mcavana

I would hold back 3 females from the first litter, and one male from the second litter. That is your new breeding group. As soon as ALL the babies are weaned, feed off the moms.

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just curious, why feed off the moms? because one of them killed the male? I'm trying to learn as much about asf's as I can as I will be getting a trio soon (perhaps 2 sets of trio's). thanx.

ASF's are very community based. ANY outsiders coming into the group receive the death penalty.

Oh okay... a new male couldn't be put into the group, have to start a new group. I get it.. thanx. :D

Hey i just seen this on another forum, "If I find that I need to replace a female..or male...I only do this when I clean the tub. By adding the new rat and the rest of the colony to a clean tub with new fresh bedding...they do not fight with the new cage member. "

I know when i was younger, we had puppies that we fostered to another mom dog. When we did it we put baby powder on them and put them all together and the mom did not know which ones were hers. I have not tried this yet put could be a possibility.

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Originally Posted by Microddot

Hey i just seen this on another forum, "If I find that I need to replace a female..or male...I only do this when I clean the tub. By adding the new rat and the rest of the colony to a clean tub with new fresh bedding...they do not fight with the new cage member. "
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I have learned first hand that this is NOT normally true. The established group will fight and possibly kill the newcommer.

The reason I was suggesting to feed off the moms is because unless i misunderstood, you just got them and don't know their age. it is better to have a breeding group all the same age... and it is best to keep track of that age.

Micro: I'm not sure if they (the forum quote) are talking about an establish breeding group of females, or just a bunch of asf's? Generally, females that have been bred and dropped litters wont take a new male from an outside source, even when young and small... maybe some groups are ok with it, but I have only found leaving one of their sons in there to grow up and breed works, or start a new group all together.


I mix and match ASF's that arent in an established breeding group all the time, every week they get moved around split up and put into different cleaned tubs.

No idea why you`re being told to feed off the moms? Seems a bit illogical. These guys take forever to start breeding so why put yourself out?

Just hold back one of the sons to take the dad`s place.

Problem solved.

Bruce

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Originally Posted by Bruce Whitehead

No idea why you`re being told to feed off the moms? Seems a bit illogical.

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Originally Posted by mcavana

The reason I was suggesting to feed off the moms is because unless i misunderstood, you just got them and don't know their age. it is better to have a breeding group all the same age... and it is best to keep track of that age.

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Bruce, he does not know the ages of the moms because he just purchased the group. For all we know the male died of old age! Why spend all that time growing up one of the sons if the moms may not even be able to have another litter 2 months from now? that is all I am saying...

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Originally Posted by littleindiangirl

Micro: I'm not sure if they (the forum quote) are talking about an establish breeding group of females, or just a bunch of asf's? Generally, females that have been bred and dropped litters wont take a new male from an outside source, even when young and small... maybe some groups are ok with it, but I have only found leaving one of their sons in there to grow up and breed works, or start a new group all together.


I mix and match ASF's that arent in an established breeding group all the time, every week they get moved around split up and put into different cleaned tubs.

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I agree with connie 100%... I should have been clearer.

You can mix and match all you want with younger ASF's.... but once a pregnancy occurs the rules change. You can no longer mix and match without fighting.

Sorry, was in a hurry last time I posted. I wanted to tell the story of the first hand experience I had...

A few months ago I had a 1.4 group set up that had not yet had any babies. The male died for no apparent reason. I still wanted to breed the females, because they were already at breeding age... Because they weren't pregnant yet (or so I thought) I figured I would try to throw in a new full grown male... the result was the most discusting thing I have ever seen. Still turns my stomach every time I think about it.... Keep reading if you want to know what happned. WARNING, it is very horrible...
















Well I cleaned the tank and put in new bedding... put the three ladies and the new male in at the same time. The ladies immediately started sniffing him. Before I went to bed the girls were sleeping on one side of the tank, he was sleeping on the other. I assumed all was fine.

The next morning he was clearly injured... he was walking with a serious limp, and seemed very week. there was blood on the substrate... I picked him up and almost puked. The girls, (who ended up being pregnant from the origional male that died) had eaten off his scrotum. :weirdface

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Originally Posted by mcavana

Bruce, he does not know the ages of the moms because he just purchased the group. For all we know the male died of old age! Why spend all that time growing up one of the sons if the moms may not even be able to have another litter 2 months from now? that is all I am saying...

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Well then, if they die before he gets his game on, then feed them off... but being that he doesn't know their ages it doesn't make sense to feed them off. Even if those females only give him two litters, it'll be quicker than waiting for newborn females to get up to weight and start producing.

That being said they could give back to back babies for a year.

I just don't throw out bathwater till I make sure all the babies are accounted for... that's all.

Bruce

Meh... edited out

I agree with bruce. it takes quite some time to raise females to breeding age. I personally would establish more trios with the babies you have produced AND grow up a new male to go with your existing females. That way if the older females dont produce you still have other trios in the works.

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Originally Posted by Somed00d

I agree with bruce. it takes quite some time to raise females to breeding age. I personally would establish more trios with the babies you have produced AND grow up a new male to go with your existing females. That way if the older females dont produce you still have other trios in the works.

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Even better!!!

I agree with bruce. it takes quite some time to raise females to breeding age. I personally would establish more trios with the babies you have produced AND grow up a new male to go with your existing females. That way if the older females dont produce you still have other trios in the works.

That sounds about what I was thinking.. I still have 3 very prego females. One in this trio and 2 from another. I plan on starting 3 or 4 more breeding groups from this first go round.

Why would you suggest 1.3 over 1.2 out of curiousity?

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Originally Posted by Cougr

[I]
Why would you suggest 1.3 over 1.2 out of curiousity?

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More bang for the buck and effort... with a minimum size enclosure of a 10 gallon tank, 1.3 will fit just fine. If you don't need to produce many asf's then go with 1.2

At the moment I have 12 breeding tanks set up with 1.3 set up in each... that is 36 females pumping out an average of 12 babies a month... 432 babies a month. If I had 1.2 setups, The tanks would still be taking us just as much room, cost close to the same to maintian, but would only have 24 females pumping out about 288 babies per month.

i would listen to mike. i speak from experience also. i was sold 1.4 breeder group. already full size adults. their output was horrible. i was only getting 6-9 babies per litter and that was only from 2 females the other 2 didn't even produce i kept back 1.3 and stared all over. now i know there age and can monitor them accordingly. it's just makes things simple. i was feeding them off and am down to my biggest female and the male. just when i get ready to feed off the female, she pops out 5 more babies. i figure i will give her one last litter out of respect. thanks again mike.

I came home Wednesday to a very interesting suprise. The same mom that gave birth the first time had another 16 little ones on the 15th. She somehow got pregnant withen the 2 days before she killed off the dad. So basically she had pups again withen 24 days of the first litter.