Temperatures affecting reproduction?

[Jay_Bunny]

I have a female rat that I got on 4/1/15. She was sold as a small rat so she was probably around 5-6 weeks old. I got a male on 5/20/15. I wasn't sure on his age but a month later he weighed around 120g and the female (at the time he would have been around 16-17 weeks old) and she weighed 165g. She's now about 19-20 weeks old (last weigh in was 6/30 and she was 208g) and I have not gotten a litter from her yet. They are kept in the same room as my reptiles so the room is around 78-80 during the summer. I cannot move them to another room. Could the hot temp be affecting their ability to reproduce? I would have thought she'd have a litter by now. The male isn't that much younger than her....maybe by a month or so.

I also have a 1.4 group of mice and I suspect at least one is pregnant so this has me concerned that maybe there is something going on with the female.

[Stewart_Reptiles]

Yes temperature does affect production, based on my experience production seems to be optimal in the 60's low 70's, of course there can be other factors as well and while they can breed very early I found that breeding them starting at 250 grams tend to yield far better results.

[Jay_Bunny]

I have no way of moving them to a different room and my racks heat best if I keep the room at 80. In the fall and winter I let the room drop to 75 to help conserve electricity. Maybe I'll try cooling the room a few degrees and see if that helps. Thank you.

[frostysBP]

Sometimes they just take longer to get going. My first breeders didn't produce for 3 months then boom I'm getting a litter a week now . my temps are 75 80 and last week got up to 87. All I did was blow a fan on them.

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[Jay_Bunny]

I got the room down to about 76 but that's as low as I can get it. Hopefully they will start producing soon. My frozen is almost used up.

I plan on building a few racks and getting a fan to circulate air a bit better in the room.

[PitOnTheProwl]

I keep my shed between 75 to 80 without any breeding problems. I do know when we hit our triple digits here in Texas there were times before I insulated the shed that it would get in the high 80s and production would stop.

[Tsanford]

I've always kept temps right, it I have noticed that different temps would give me more males or females in a litter. At one point every baby from 5+ rats would be all female every time!

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