when to cull mice?

Hopefully the poll will work. Have 3 corns from juvenile to adult, 2 juvy black pinesnakes, and 2 juvy black milksnakes. Plan on raising 1.3 colony of breeder mice for feeders. Just curious as to whether people grow their mice to adulthood as feeders, cull them young and buy frozen adults or sell surpluses and use what they need.
I've fed live and fresh killed before and the quality just looks so much better than frozen.

I've got many, many, many snakes (did I mention that I have many snakes?) of various sizes. I raise my own rodents and use the size I need when it's feeding time. Any extras I sell off. I have a few customers that I sell to every week and/or every month.

All the weanling pups go into the juevenile tubs~ when the juvie tubs get too full I CO2 and freeze the extra (been a long time since there was extra, need to build another rack or two!) When I have several bags of frozen I advertise them for sale on the cheap. They sell pretty easy.

I used to put all the extras in the "weaner bin" and then freeze/selll the extras... when choosing feeders I tended to choose males over females to feed off to eliminate male smell... I haven't had any extras for about 8 months, probably won't have extras for a while still.... but with the bigger snakes sleeping for the winter, I might finally get some surplus for the freezer. It's the rats that I tend to sell off faster.... live or frozen, I've probably made $300 to $500 just from selling rats in the last 12 months. (I have 6 breeder bins of rats and one weaner bin).

looks like the mice to care of the first litter for me. All I found left was a pinky butt. Any way to tell who the culprit is? I'm guessing the male or the mother? The male mated with the mother the day after the pinkies were gone. Also the little brown/greyish mouse never got very big and didn't want to mate with the male although he was interested in her. Stupid question - if the mouse was a actually a field or house mouse would they still be able to mate?

I cull my mice as and when I need them, I have a seperate tub for "feeders" that are not used in the breeding colonies, the mice go in there once they are weaned.

If I need a whole lot of fuzzies for example, I might cull off an entire litter and freeze them.

So my answer to the poll is "None of the above". lol

I can't vote, because my choice isn't there.

I cull as I need them. I know I need pinkies next spring, so I am culling lots of pinkies early. When I get low on a specific size...I start culling that size. I try to keep several of various sizes alive and growing so I have a supply to choose from...most of the time...it doesn't always work out.

I rarely have extra mice, but I occasionally get extra rats, so I sell them at the shop I work at...

I don't quite get what the point of this poll is, but I can't vote either.
I have 4 small mouse colonies (1.2 each) and 2 small ASF colonies. I cull them at all ages, depending on what size seems to be in low stock in the freezer.

To me, the whole point of breeding your own feeders is to have flexibility and be able to get feeders at the exact size needed for each snake. Following some arbitrary plan to cull them all at one particular point in time doesn't seem to make much sense, unless all of your snakes are identical in size and age.

bahh...another ridiculously old thread. Why do you all keep digging these things up?

Same here.... I can't vote.

I just started colonies with 1.3 (ended up 1.1 after all the fighting) and their first little is now at more or less at hopper stage. They only leave the nest when I get in there, but they look like mini-mice, very cute, but snake food as I keep telling my two daughters, lol. I also have a colony of 1.3 ASFs, but only pregnancies so far, no pinks yet!

I have currently 26 snakes of all various types and various sizes. Once I get the colonies more established, I will cull what I need and let others to grow to adult to seed other colonies. So more or less I'll be culling whatever size is need to fill that bin in the freezer. I hope to eventually have enough colonies going that I can just pick and choose whatever size I need, then cull them off and stockpile in freezer. If it seems like I am getting too many, I have friends and a petstore who would be more than willing to buy them.

Flagg said:

bahh...another ridiculously old thread. Why do you all keep digging these things up?

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GRRRRRRRRRRRRR............................................

I just saw that after I hit submit, lol. Where do these keep coming from?
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