When is breeding your own rats VS. buying frozen the tipping point?

Me and my daughter have 3 snakes atm after next month it will be 6-7. At what point is breeding my own rats going to be more cost effective then buying what I need. currently I'm buying from big cheese. I know there are cons and pros to either looking at cost of bedding and food vs shipping and storage. We are shooting for babies next season

I started when my collection was about 10 animals (long time ago) , there was also the fact that I did intend to breed snake so access to live food would be essential, and there was also the matter of quality as well as not relying on anyone else. (rat shortage is something all feeder producers experience)

I started with 17 snakes earlier this year with both a small colony of mice and the rats. I have a total of 12 rat eaters and 5 mouse eaters at the moment. For me, I have a few who feed better in live or pre kill and it is significantly cheaper to breed my own and have that readily available. One of the local places that sells live feeders charges $4.50 plus tax for a live rat pup which makes the difference in cost significantly easier to justify. By my calculations, even with my upfront costs, it will work out cheaper to breed by a significant margin even just to feed my own snakes if they did all eat frozen thaw.

I also enjoy the rodents themselves and while they're not pets, the breeders are definitely treated well. It helps significantly that I invested in pet-quality lines for my rats; no tub chewing and no aggression whatsoever, if you start from scratch with pet store animals or feeder bin animals, breeding out those traits can be frustrating and cost a lot (chewers especially when you have to replace bins or cover holes frequently).

Since my rats are pet quality, I have the option to raise up extras for sale to pet homes to offset the cost of feed and bedding as well as excess feeders to local friends.

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My time is worth something and I do not enjoy the time/space/energy dedicated to producing rats/mice. However, above 25 snakes-I found the cost of rodents I was feeding on a weekly basis prohibitive of buying them online.

I do admit that I probably spent more money setting up my breeding colony (using second-hand laboratory equipment) than was cost effective: short-term. However, long-term, at heavy rodent production I reap significant financial benefits.

Something I would seriously consider before breeding my own rodents would be an economical food source e.g. a Tractor Supply with Doggie Bag Dog Food (~$14/40lbs.) or a grain store of some sort that carries (or could order you) Mazuri 6F Rodent Lab Blocks (~$25/50lbs). Buying small bags of rodent food at PetCo or PetSmart to feed your colony is not economically viable vs. buying rodents online.

Like Lord said I kind of forgot the time and energy that also goes with it.

I did a colony of 140 females and 5 males when I finally decided I wanted my weekends back.
At that time I was feeding over 50 snakes not including hatchlings.
After 5 or 6 years I just got tired of it.
I did recoup a lot of my money selling the extra feeders.