Vote for BP.Net for the 2013 Forum of the Year! Click here for more info.

» Site Navigation

» Home
 > FAQ

» Online Users: 2,888

0 members and 2,888 guests
No Members online
Most users ever online was 6,337, 01-24-2020 at 04:30 AM.

» Today's Birthdays

None

» Stats

Members: 75,031
Threads: 248,489
Posts: 2,568,441
Top Poster: JLC (31,651)
Welcome to our newest member, isismomma
Page 1 of 3 123 LastLast
Results 1 to 10 of 23
  1. #1
    Registered User
    Join Date
    11-22-2019
    Posts
    20
    Thanks
    3
    Thanked 4 Times in 3 Posts

    Looking to start a small colony

    Hey guys,

    I'm looking to start a small rat colony to feed my collection of 5 snakes. Can anyone give me an idea of how their operations work? I was thinking 1 male to 2 females.. but does the male have to live solo or can he live with the ladies? I know they don't do well solo so I thought I'd check that point. Anything else I should know?

    Thank you in advance

  2. #2
    BPnet Veteran
    Join Date
    07-07-2019
    Posts
    537
    Thanks
    19
    Thanked 434 Times in 278 Posts
    Images: 9
    Buy one female from a pet store that houses the males an females together. Works 99% of the time. Build a rack system an you’ll be fine. When I get home I’ll post the links.

    Are you ready to gas an freeze? Rats grow fast. If you live feed your gonna have a ton of rats. Unless you separate males an females. Every 21 days they can drop a new litter.

    Good luck!

  3. #3
    Registered User
    Join Date
    11-22-2019
    Posts
    20
    Thanks
    3
    Thanked 4 Times in 3 Posts
    Thank you for the reply! I'm looking into building my own CO2 chamber to euthanize and then I'll be freezing. I'm not sure if there are any pet stores around here that keep them together.. I was going to go to my local feeder supplier and just grab a male and female (or two females) off of them to get started. Seems cheaper than paying a pet store price too

    Do you keep your males in with the females constantly or just to breed and then they go back to their enclosure solo?

  4. #4
    BPnet Veteran nikkubus's Avatar
    Join Date
    12-20-2018
    Posts
    1,370
    Thanks
    2,509
    Thanked 1,847 Times in 972 Posts
    There are a lot of ways to do things, and scale makes a huge difference the best way. What and how many or what age are you trying to feed them to?
    7.22 BP 1.4 corn 1.1 SD retic 0.1 hognose

  5. #5
    BPnet Veteran
    Join Date
    07-07-2019
    Posts
    537
    Thanks
    19
    Thanked 434 Times in 278 Posts
    Images: 9
    Give your general location an somebody will point you to rats. As for getting them from your breeder of feeders. I wouldn't get a full colony that way. Too much inbreeding.

    Learn from my mistakes.
    1) Don't leave the male in when it's pup time. It will start fights, cause stress on mom an you may loose all the pinkies.
    2) Don't leave unbred females in with ones about to drop. Stress an baby stealing= lost babies.
    3) If you can't give a female her own tub at litter time. Make sure it's no more then two an they are the same size.
    4) Handle all rats. You don't need a demon that attacks you. Cull nasty rats.
    5) Injured rats need to be removed at once. Or they will be killed an eaten.
    6) You want the females to drop within a day of each another.
    7) Have rat traps or glue traps in the rat room!!!!!
    8)Pull mom out at 33 days (35 is weaned) or her sons will breed her!
    9)Separate males an females at weaning. Unless your gassing at or before 55 days.

    White rats while it's the norm for feeders adding color is good. If white rats aren't available some snake won't eat colored rats. I don't raise white rats. Colored rats bring more money if you sell a few pets.

    Check face book for rodent breeders near you. Quality rats equals quality snake food.
    I use Doggy Bag (dog food $14 for 44Lbs) from TSC for feed.
    I put four females in with two males for 16 days. Then the girls go into their own tubs. Some tubs will have two females unless they show stress signs.
    I give the girls one to two weeks off after I take the kids. Most big breeders don't, as rats only last 2-3 years. I cull females if litter size bottoms out or they're bad moms. My breeding female are 500g+ the males are 600g+.

    I add "new" blood once a year so so. Trade males or buy a prago female an keep a few.

    I also raise ASF (African Soft Furs). I like then better then Norway rats BUT they grow slowwwwwww.

    I used this for racks with some mods.


    Building a Rat Rack (arbreptiles.com)

    Impotent rodent facts:

    miscsigl.vp (afrma.org)


    Good luck!

  6. The Following 4 Users Say Thank You to 303_enfield For This Useful Post:

    Caitlin (02-06-2021),cincy (02-08-2021),nikkubus (02-05-2021),Pickenprod (12-05-2021)

  7. #6
    BPnet Veteran nikkubus's Avatar
    Join Date
    12-20-2018
    Posts
    1,370
    Thanks
    2,509
    Thanked 1,847 Times in 972 Posts

    Re: Looking to start a small colony

    Quote Originally Posted by 303_enfield View Post
    Give your general location an somebody will point you to rats. As for getting them from your breeder of feeders. I wouldn't get a full colony that way. Too much inbreeding.

    Learn from my mistakes.
    1) Don't leave the male in when it's pup time. It will start fights, cause stress on mom an you may loose all the pinkies.
    2) Don't leave unbred females in with ones about to drop. Stress an baby stealing= lost babies.
    3) If you can't give a female her own tub at litter time. Make sure it's no more then two an they are the same size.
    4) Handle all rats. You don't need a demon that attacks you. Cull nasty rats.
    5) Injured rats need to be removed at once. Or they will be killed an eaten.
    6) You want the females to drop within a day of each another.
    7) Have rat traps or glue traps in the rat room!!!!!
    8)Pull mom out at 33 days (35 is weaned) or her sons will breed her!
    9)Separate males an females at weaning. Unless your gassing at or before 55 days.

    White rats while it's the norm for feeders adding color is good. If white rats aren't available some snake won't eat colored rats. I don't raise white rats. Colored rats bring more money if you sell a few pets.

    Check face book for rodent breeders near you. Quality rats equals quality snake food.
    I use Doggy Bag (dog food $14 for 44Lbs) from TSC for feed.
    I put four females in with two males for 16 days. Then the girls go into their own tubs. Some tubs will have two females unless they show stress signs.
    I give the girls one to two weeks off after I take the kids. Most big breeders don't, as rats only last 2-3 years. I cull females if litter size bottoms out or they're bad moms. My breeding female are 500g+ the males are 600g+.

    I add "new" blood once a year so so. Trade males or buy a prago female an keep a few.

    I also raise ASF (African Soft Furs). I like then better then Norway rats BUT they grow slowwwwwww.

    I used this for racks with some mods.


    Building a Rat Rack (arbreptiles.com)

    Impotent rodent facts:

    miscsigl.vp (afrma.org)


    Good luck!
    I agree with pretty much all of this. I would spend the extra couple bucks to get quality rodent food from the feed store vs dog food personally because you will get better, healthier feeders, but it's not a must. I would give the females a bit more of a break, like 4-6 weeks after weaning babies. You should get bigger litters, bigger babies, and have the females last a bit longer before they start to throw small litters. But that won't make or break things either, and if your scale is small you might be better off with a different interval so that you have a steady supply of live at whatever size you need. I'm assuming you need at least some live on hand to want to go through with the trouble of breeding because the money savings over rodent pro alone isn't enough to justify the amount of work (to me) after you pay for the co2, unless you are breeding on a pretty crazy big scale to get big quantity discounts on everything.

    That rack looks almost identical to mine. I would caution you, if you go with 1/2" hardware cloth, DO NOT put the water valves like they have them there. You will end up with a flooded mess because they will pull it down into the tub and chew the water line. Also make sure your tubs slide in there pretty snug or they will get their teeth between the tub and the hardware cloth and chew holes into the tub and escape.
    7.22 BP 1.4 corn 1.1 SD retic 0.1 hognose

  8. The Following User Says Thank You to nikkubus For This Useful Post:

    Bogertophis (02-06-2021)

  9. #7
    Registered User
    Join Date
    11-22-2019
    Posts
    20
    Thanks
    3
    Thanked 4 Times in 3 Posts

    Re: Looking to start a small colony

    Quote Originally Posted by 303_enfield View Post
    Give your general location an somebody will point you to rats. As for getting them from your breeder of feeders. I wouldn't get a full colony that way. Too much inbreeding.

    Learn from my mistakes.
    1) Don't leave the male in when it's pup time. It will start fights, cause stress on mom an you may loose all the pinkies.
    2) Don't leave unbred females in with ones about to drop. Stress an baby stealing= lost babies.
    3) If you can't give a female her own tub at litter time. Make sure it's no more then two an they are the same size.
    4) Handle all rats. You don't need a demon that attacks you. Cull nasty rats.
    5) Injured rats need to be removed at once. Or they will be killed an eaten.
    6) You want the females to drop within a day of each another.
    7) Have rat traps or glue traps in the rat room!!!!!
    8)Pull mom out at 33 days (35 is weaned) or her sons will breed her!
    9)Separate males an females at weaning. Unless your gassing at or before 55 days.

    White rats while it's the norm for feeders adding color is good. If white rats aren't available some snake won't eat colored rats. I don't raise white rats. Colored rats bring more money if you sell a few pets.

    Check face book for rodent breeders near you. Quality rats equals quality snake food.
    I use Doggy Bag (dog food $14 for 44Lbs) from TSC for feed.
    I put four females in with two males for 16 days. Then the girls go into their own tubs. Some tubs will have two females unless they show stress signs.
    I give the girls one to two weeks off after I take the kids. Most big breeders don't, as rats only last 2-3 years. I cull females if litter size bottoms out or they're bad moms. My breeding female are 500g+ the males are 600g+.

    I add "new" blood once a year so so. Trade males or buy a prago female an keep a few.

    I also raise ASF (African Soft Furs). I like then better then Norway rats BUT they grow slowwwwwww.

    I used this for racks with some mods.


    Building a Rat Rack (arbreptiles.com)

    Impotent rodent facts:

    miscsigl.vp (afrma.org)


    Good luck!
    Wow, thank you for such a detailed reply. Just a few questions about what you've said..

    You said that leaving a male in with the female will cause fights, do you mean fights between the male and the mom? I've heard of some people that leave the male in with the females full time? My hope is to breed both females at the same time, so that they drop within a day or two of each other.

    Do you find that you sell many for pets too? I worried if I got into coloured rats then I would want to keep too many, so I figured I'd go with white.. but I didn't think about selling to pet homes

    In terms of what I'm looking to feed, I have two adult ball pythons (male and female), a Kenyan sand boa and 2 adult russian ratsnakes.. so the sizes I'll need will vary. I'm planning on pairing the ratsnakes and the ball pythons so having a steady supply of live and frozen food will definitely save me some money.

    Thank you again for the advice everyone, I really appreciate it

  10. #8
    BPnet Veteran nikkubus's Avatar
    Join Date
    12-20-2018
    Posts
    1,370
    Thanks
    2,509
    Thanked 1,847 Times in 972 Posts

    Re: Looking to start a small colony

    Quote Originally Posted by Mrr View Post
    Wow, thank you for such a detailed reply. Just a few questions about what you've said..

    You said that leaving a male in with the female will cause fights, do you mean fights between the male and the mom? I've heard of some people that leave the male in with the females full time? My hope is to breed both females at the same time, so that they drop within a day or two of each other.

    In terms of what I'm looking to feed, I have two adult ball pythons (male and female), a Kenyan sand boa and 2 adult russian ratsnakes.
    The females can get aggressive toward the male, the male can get aggressive to the babies. Some people leave the male and it works just fine. I've done it both ways, but have had a lot better results pulling the male before babies are born. He can impregnate her again right after delivering, and you are going to get a serious decline in litter size doing that. Sometimes they won't fight, but I would say at least 20% of the time leaving males in with females babies get cannibalized.

    With that amount of snakes you are probably fine only giving the females 2 weeks off and just replacing females at a faster rate. 2.4 should more than cover you I would think.
    7.22 BP 1.4 corn 1.1 SD retic 0.1 hognose

  11. #9
    BPnet Veteran
    Join Date
    07-07-2019
    Posts
    537
    Thanks
    19
    Thanked 434 Times in 278 Posts
    Images: 9
    For me an every breeder rodent breeder I deal with. Leaving a male Norway Rat in all the time causes problems. He just wants to breed. Mom wants to take care of the babies. Stress her an she first will try to move the babies. Then she will eat them. Now, I've been raising Norways since the 70's. In the old days it was 10 an 20 gallon long tanks. I had more then one male torn up by a female. Mice(for the most part) an ASF can stay in. To add "new" blood for the ASF it's add pinks or just start new, for me.

    As selling pets. I have a surplus so it's sell frozen, live pups to some Ball breeders. An the $20 blue rats an $10 fancy rats as pets.

    As for others saying use rodent feed. The dye free dog food ($14 for 44lbs) has a better conversion rate then Mazuri (25lb at $26).

    Litter size. Well, I keep females that drop 12+. One Blue is three, weighs 610g an still drops 12+. Will she make it to four? Don't know but unless she slows down I'll keep breeding her. Large females drop large pinkies compared to young 300g females. The "new' blood I just bought are blues. Booth females (220g+/-) dropped 16 pinks an they are as small as ASF pinks. I had them in the same tub an didn't know they where that prago.

    Giving females a month off. Are your freezers full? That's a waste of feed, litter an time. One to two weeks puts weight back on (two weeks is long).

    I run 1/4" hardware wire on my racks. Nobody gets out unless I don't close a cage or the kids playing with some drop one. If using the mixing tubs with the nail hole, cover it with wire or flashing.

    For litter I use TSC pine (yes pine it's been kiln dried) flakes. Four sheets of free newspaper on the bottom an 1-2" of flakes. I have used horse bedding pellets (I have horses) under the flakes for odor. With ASF it works, with rats it was a waste. Rats will turn the flakes over daily an shred the paper. ASF don't turn the flakes over daily or shred the paper. Paper makes changing litter easy.

    If I was you an only wanted to raise just rats. I'd get one male an four females to start. That way I could have two in with the male for 14/15 days then throw them in birthing tubs an the other two in with the male. If you raise fancy live extras pay for feed, litter an time faster then frozen prey.


    For "free" rats check your local animal shelters. You'd be shocked at the amount of rats, rabbits, ducks, snakes.... turned in. Craigs list will have them also. Find a non franchise type pet shop that sells rodents. Most have males an females together.

    More rat stuff:

    Fancy Rat Varieties: Fur Color, Eye Color, Coat Type, and Markings - PetHelpful - By fellow animal lovers and experts

    Good luck!
    Last edited by 303_enfield; 02-05-2021 at 09:57 PM.

  12. #10
    BPnet Veteran Spicey's Avatar
    Join Date
    11-07-2019
    Location
    St. Louis, Missouri
    Posts
    284
    Thanks
    619
    Thanked 273 Times in 163 Posts
    Images: 10
    Just a note - if you use an automatic drip waterer in a rack, make ABSOLUTELY SURE that the rats can't somehow get to the tubes and perhaps pull off a valve. My daughter's rat supplier lost his entire stock when one of his top-tier rats did exactly that and flooded all the tubs.
    "Something Clever"

    1.0 Paradox Albino KSB - Spotticus
    0.1 Dutch Rabbit - Wendy

Page 1 of 3 123 LastLast

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •  
Powered by vBadvanced CMPS v4.2.1