Fostering mouse babies

[kc261]

One of my newly formed colonies has so far eaten all of their babies, about 4 litters, but I don't remember exactly. Needless to say, I am not happy, especially since all of the females are 2nd generation, and I thought it was supposed to get better! (The other colony I formed on the same day had all 2nd generation mice, and that one is doing great, so the rumors are at least partly true.)

Yesterday another litter was born, and when I found it there were 6 live pinks, and at least 4 half-eaten bodies. I decided to try an experiment and left 2 pinks with the colony, and put 2 each in 2 other colonies. I thought about putting them in colonies that had pinks only a few days old, but decided to put them in colonies that had fuzzies so I'd know which mice came from which parents more easily.

The 2 pinks left with their parents have now both been eaten. I think my next step will be to remove the male and see if the females will raise the babies ok or not.

The 4 pinks put into other colonies have now been there for about 24 hours, and seem to be doing fine. All 4 had visible milk bands, so I know they are nursing ok.

Has anyone else tried this? What were your results? I sort of thought with mice the "intruders" were likely to be eaten, and it would possibly upset the foster colonies enough they'd eat their own babies as well, so I'm pleasantly surprised with the results so far.

[JamieLynn]

Sometimes its not the male eating the babies, but some mothers will fight over them and kill them. lots of things can cause this. But in my experiance fostering can work, though it is better to give the foster moms babies the same size as thier own, that way the mom doesn't think that there is something wrong with the smaller babies and kill them.

[Clear]

Get rid of the colony that is eating the babies. With my colonies if any of the babies get eaten after the 2nd birth, they are all gone and replaced.

[kc261]

it is better to give the foster moms babies the same size as thier own, that way the mom doesn't think that there is something wrong with the smaller babies and kill them.

Really? They do that? I haven't seen it, so I had no idea. I've had a few litters grow up with a runty baby. In some cases, the runt died somewhere in the fuzzy/hopper age range, but appeared fully intact, so I assumed it just had something wrong with it and died, rather than being killed. Right now I have one really tiny baby in my grow up cage that seems almost perfectly healthy other than her size. Her fur does seem a little thin so I'm just watching to see what happens out of curiosity mostly, plus she's pretty cute. I've also had several times when one litter is born, and another is born maybe a week later, and that doesn't seem to cause problems either.

Maybe my mice are just stupid about culling off their weak offspring.

Get rid of the colony that is eating the babies. With my colonies if any of the babies get eaten after the 2nd birth, they are all gone and replaced.

I probably should have explained a little more. This is a 1.4 colony, so they've really just had about one round of babies. They have pretty much used up their chances now, though; it is just a matter of waiting for some replacements to grow up.