Does anyone raise their own feeders?

Does anyone raise their own mice for feeding?

Is it super hard? I have had mice before, as pets, so I know about taking care of them, but I have never had mice babies or anything like that.

too much work? or did you get totally loaded down with way too many?

I am guessing if I had too many i could share them.

Any experience with this?

I crave knowledge!

Yes, there are quite a few people that breed their own feeders. Feel free to take a look at the forums designated for feeders here. (I went ahead and moved this message to the General Feeder forum) There is a ton of info already there.

To answer your questions... I don't think it's that difficult. It probably takes more work than caring for the snakes, but that's not saying much. As long as you have a good setup and routine, it's pretty easy... and fun.

I am sorry!!! I guess I need to look a little better next time!!!

Thank you for moving this!

I raise rats, asf, and mice

Is it work, yes it can be depending on the size of your colony.

Is it hard? Mice can be tricky to start but once you get started it is as easy as any other rodents.

The things to consider are whether or not it is worth it for you to breed; you also need to consider the time and the cost of breeding and as Lawrence mentioned you will find a lot of helpful info in our feeder section.

If you've had pet mice before, I say go for it. I have a whole whopping 4 baby balls and one juvie corn, and I'm starting breeding, simply because I like rodents. Check your local petstores (don't bother with Petco or Petsmart) to see if you can trade excess mice in for store credit. This can cover your feed/bedding bill and probably extra mice later down the line for outcrossing. You could also probably sell some in the local classifieds for straight cash for whatever else.

If I do decide to breed mice for feeding, I am not going to do it to save money.

Its kinda like why I make my own bread, just cause I can say, I made that, lol

We kinda like to diy around here, we make all our own cleaning stuff, diapers for the kids, our dogs eat a raw diet. stuff like that.

all our furniture my dh made, we are crafty people and sometimes it takes more money to diy then not to, but its just so we feel better about ourselves.. kwim?

We raise our own rats and african soft furred rats (never had much luck with mice). I like raising them partly for the cost savings, partly for the convenience of having so many sizes available to me to tailor to a particular snake's feeding needs that week but mostly because I love knowing the quality feeders that the snakes are getting.

I used to raise chickens, ducks and geese for our table much for the same reason. I really liked the idea that my kids were eating a chicken that I raised the way I wanted it raised for my table. Had a huge kitchen garden too, much for the same reasons. Wish I had the room to do that these days.

I raise asf's rats & mice,mice are tricky stinky devils they still eat their young alot hate them but my one ball is a mouser so I have to raise them.

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Originally Posted by gsx2ts4u

If I do decide to breed mice for feeding, I am not going to do it to save money.

Its kinda like why I make my own bread, just cause I can say, I made that, lol

We kinda like to diy around here, we make all our own cleaning stuff, diapers for the kids, our dogs eat a raw diet. stuff like that.

all our furniture my dh made, we are crafty people and sometimes it takes more money to diy then not to, but its just so we feel better about ourselves.. kwim?

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Around here regular white bread is $1.25 per loaf. Homemade really is cheaper, but my husband refuses to eat it (only thing he won't eat that's homemade) and I'm not a bread eater, so, it's pointless here. Lol.

People are saying that mice eat their young a lot, however, I think a small time mouse breeder will be fine with this, especially if you're raising them for fun as well. The more handling a mouse gets, the less likely she's going to kill her litter because picking babies out for feeding isn't going to be as stressful on her as it may be for a mouse that never gets handled.

Ive raised Gerbils, mice, rats, and asfs! So far all have been great. The rats of coarse grew well, but will soon out grow you even with alot of snakes should one male escape you( grow past med rat somehow) Mice grow slow and stink, but grew hugely in a short time. And asfs I have just started, stink less, and are nicely sized. Just have enough snakes to eat, nothing's worse than putting down ten+ rodents because you could not feed them off, I feel so bad doing so to put in the freezer once they start to get a little bit bigger than I want:oops:

Gerbil was a accident, bought her pregnant. Not really for balls but it is something they can eat that I have raised.

I hear that some finikey snakes will only eat gerbils.

Learning and growing.. thanks for the advice.

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The more handling a mouse gets, the less likely she's going to kill her litter because picking babies out for feeding isn't going to be as stressful on her as it may be for a mouse that never gets handled.

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I will have to disagree, to successfully breed mice as feeder you need to provide them with maximum security.

Handling them too much will lead to cannibalism, checking on them however is different and can be done, over handling will cause stress - stress will cause cannibalism.

I don't handle my mice except on cleaning day, I do however check on them opening their tubs everyday, which make them less skittish and use to my presence.

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Originally Posted by gsx2ts4u

I hear that some finikey snakes will only eat gerbils.

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I would not recommend gerbils, if a BP imprints on gerbils it can be very hard almost impossible to switch him back to other rodents, which could be an issue if you no longer had access to gerbils or had to re-home your snakes.

In most cases when a new owner experience feeding issues it is generally due to husbandry not the prey item itself.

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Originally Posted by gsx2ts4u

I hear that some finikey snakes will only eat gerbils.

Learning and growing.. thanks for the advice.

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It's more like the owner fed the snake a gerbil and now the snake just wants gerbils LOL. You may want to consider african soft furred rats. You get pretty much all the benefits of mice plus no stink and much less issues with eating their own young. Very very snakes refuse to eat ASF's.

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Originally Posted by Deborah

I will have to disagree, to successfully breed mice as feeder you need to provide them with maximum security.

Handling them too much will lead to cannibalism, checking on them however is different and can be done, over handling will cause stress - stress will cause cannibalism.

I don't handle my mice except on cleaning day, I do however check on them opening their tubs everyday, which make them less skittish and use to my presence.

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How do you think hobby breeders breed mice? Handling does not stress a mouse that is tame. With small time mouse breeders, handling is your best bet, because you won't have to worry about stressing the females by picking babies out. I've had plenty of mice that have been handled throughout the pregnancy and raising of the litter, along with daily handling of each litter from day one, all without any problems. I only hear of major cannibalism stories in feeder breeders, it's not as common in fancy breeders because these folks have tame mice.

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Originally Posted by Bettacreek

How do you think hobby breeders breed mice? Handling does not stress a mouse that is tame. With small time mouse breeders, handling is your best bet, because you won't have to worry about stressing the females by picking babies out. I've had plenty of mice that have been handled throughout the pregnancy and raising of the litter, along with daily handling of each litter from day one, all without any problems. I only hear of major cannibalism stories in feeder breeders, it's not as common in fancy breeders because these folks have tame mice.

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When you breed for food your goal is to have healthy stress free breeders that can be interacted with for maintenance and removal of the babies.

Constant handling will make a female feel threaten and this is not a good strategy when they are pregnant or with a very young litter (those are not rats), definitely not something that someone trying to get started breeding mice should be doing.

if you check on them on a regular basis that is all that is needed for them to be used to your presence and allow you remove the babies safely without issues.

But what do I know I only produced about a 1000 mice in the past 2 years averaging 13-17 mice per litter with zero cannibalism. (and that is what I call small time breeder)

Again when stating a mice colony security is a MUST (I cannot tell you how many people have gave up on mice breeding because they could get their colony started)

I still don't understand where people are having problems with mice. I've never, ever had any cannibalism, even with mice that were picked up at the peak of pregnancy from the petstore and transported. In our house, daily handling of all mice (babies included) is what works best, and the only reason I can imagine for cannibalism would be nutritional deficiencies, health issues or untamed mice. Either way, I guess everyone needs to do whatever works for them.

when I don't seperate preggos & they are left in with the male & non prggo females they get ate every time! when I seperate they do well ,also I supplement with dogfood seems to help too.just lost a big litter because she dropped be,fore I seperated her then I said Ill give it a try to see what happens next day 1 left out of 12!!

I wonder if maybe that's the issue? Most hobby breeders separate their females before they drop (which is also what I do). I'm simply not convinced that handling a mouse is going to make her slaughter her litter.

I make my own bread and breed my own mice! *high-five!*

Summary of my mice breeding:

- It seemed to take a while to get the colony going, but now it's clock work.
- They stink. My tiny colony of mice way outstinks my larger colony of rats. Prepare to clean out and replace bedding often.
- Until they chill out as adults, the name "hopper" is not quite accurate. Hyper rubber bouncing ball, oh-crap-another-one-escaped-while-cleaning! is more like it. In my head, I call them "popcorn". BOING!
- And they bite. Hard. (But you can kill those - rawr).
- I love my breeders. They're great calm animals whom I handle regularly (accept when the mommas are about to give birth and about 2 weeks after birth).

I never looked into selling extras to pet stores. My extras are in the freezer as MREs. =)

lol @ MREs lol

My husbands like "aww we can name them all Meatball". lol

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Originally Posted by greghall

I raise asf's rats & mice,mice are tricky stinky devils they still eat their young alot hate them but my one ball is a mouser so I have to raise them.

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Yes me too. Right now I have more mice than my snake could consume and they keep on comming by the dosen ! :D

i breed mice and its fairly easy but the damn pregnant mouse keeps eating food like crazy and if u usually go to a pet store they ussually sellem pregnant already

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Originally Posted by freerider487

i breed mice and its fairly easy but the damn pregnant mouse keeps eating food like crazy and if u usually go to a pet store they ussually sellem pregnant already

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perhaps your peststore but im sure alot of them do not