You can start out by keeping them in tanks. Although they will be in need to be cleaned out often, such as once a week. Mice smell pretty bad though, a lot worse than rats.Originally Posted by baddawg91
Rats, from what I've heard, have much more nutrients than mice. And for a fact I know they smell a lot less, I work around them a lot.
If you do really want to breed mice, get about two 10 gallon tanks or you can even buy tubs and put some sort of screen on it so it has ventilation. One tank is for the breeders and the other is for the nursing mothers. When they have babies I believe they should be separated from the group until the babies are a bit older so she has some peace and quiet while nursing.
Aspen bedding works well for bedding. Try getting pine pellets and put some on the very bottom of the tank then layer it over with aspen. Set up a water bottle, get a food dish or make a food hopper.
As for how many to put in one tank, I would consider maybe a 1.3 or 1.4 group. I would start out with the 1.3 and see how much room you have.
As for rats, you can do just about this same thing (since they smell less you won't really need the pine pellets but their enclosure will need to be cleaned out on a weekly basis or so), although they need a larger enclosure. For rats a 1.2 or 1.3 group works well in one tub/tank, depending on how big the tub/tank actually is.
The good thing about rats is that you don't have to wait too long until the pups are the appropriate size to feed to a smaller BP, and they do grow fairly quickly.
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