• Hello!

    Either you have not registered on this site yet, or you are registered but have not logged in. In either case, you will not be able to use the full functionality of this site until you have registered, and then logged in after your registration has been approved.

    Registration is FREE, so please register so you can participate instead of remaining a lurker....

    Please be certain that the location field is correctly filled out when you register. All registrations that appear to be bogus will be rejected. Which means that if your location field does NOT match the actual location of your registration IP address, then your registration will be rejected.

    Sorry about the strictness of this requirement, but it is necessary to block spammers and scammers at the door as much as possible.

breeder mice!

cornsnakekid92

cornsnakekid92

trouser snake
i just got my first breeder mice! i have 1.2 set up
in a 10 gallon. any secrets to sucsees? and cant wait and it shouldent be long cus..... well.... my male has his hangers just lying out and are by no mean small :grin01:
 
Me too. I set up my 1.3 about 10 days ago and they are all playing nicely together. Mine are still fairly young, so am not sure when they'll produce but I decided it would be handy to have some live pinkies around when I needed them and can freeze the rest. I read through the last year of feeder postings and got some great tips on keeping the odor down...so far so good, but they aren't adults yet. (I had to promise my husband that if they got to smelling up the basement they'd be snake food, so hopefully the tips will help!)
I hope yours do well!
 
Mice are pretty simple. Just put them together, provide food, water and 9 out of 10 times you will land with bunch of little mice.
I started with 1.1 pair, now I have 3 groups 1.3 that currently have ~30 babies and just got pair of rats. Actually I'm breeding a little too much for me, I have 5 snakes, but I sell some surplus and I'm waiting for 2 new snakes to come (check here)
I had some problems with male eating youngsters, but when I put him on other group everything was and is great. He obviously didn't like those girls
:grin01:
 
One more thing : if you have any problems with mice just check archives here. When I started I learned A LOT.
 
thanks for all the info i will try to get pictures of everything up later, and is it ok to use kitty litter? and i hope urz do well to debcash
 
I'm not sure about this litter. Is is wood or newspaper based? If yes then it is fine.
 
i was also wondering about pine, i know cider is not good but what about pine??? and just to make sure you cant use pine with ur snakes can u? :shrugs:
 
No pine for snakes, but pine is fine for mice and rats, it is cheaper than aspen and absorbent. Mice bedding should be changed at least twice a week in a 10G tank to keep any odor to a minimum.
 
Pine and cedar is not good for rats, or mice, or almost any animal, it can destroy the cells in their lungs (and they have pretty weak respiratory systems as it is), damage their liver, and decrease their fertility.
 
Is this true?

lockshockbarrel said:
Pine and cedar is not good for rats, or mice, or almost any animal, it can destroy the cells in their lungs (and they have pretty weak respiratory systems as it is), damage their liver, and decrease their fertility.
Click to expand...

I was always lead to believe that pine shavings were fine with mice and rats. But now this has got me thinking, since I did switch over to pine I do have a noticeable drop in litters. lockshockbarrel please understand I am in NO way trying to discredit what you said, I am (now) genuinely concerned.

Are there any economical alternatives to aspen as a bedding then? When I do the math now this aspen use tips the bottom line back to buying frozen, it was marginal before, just the added bonus of producing my own. :shrugs:
 
graffixcs said:
I was always lead to believe that pine shavings were fine with mice and rats. But now this has got me thinking, since I did switch over to pine I do have a noticeable drop in litters. lockshockbarrel please understand I am in NO way trying to discredit what you said, I am (now) genuinely concerned.

Are there any economical alternatives to aspen as a bedding then? When I do the math now this aspen use tips the bottom line back to buying frozen, it was marginal before, just the added bonus of producing my own. :shrugs:
Click to expand...

I got my information from this article: http://www.ratfanclub.org/litters.html

There's one bedding I've heard of, Eco-Bedding, I'm on a pet rat forum and they can't stop raving about it, if you buy it from here, you can get 750 square inches for a dollar, or $2.30 per cubic foot, is that anything you had in mind?
 
lockshockbarrel thank you for the heads up, I appreciate it. It looks like a good time to change now I have learned something new.
 
I use Yesterday's News (pelleted newspaper cat litter) with my pet rats, and used to with my pet mice, and it is *fantastic* for odor control. I had to keep a written log on when to clean their cages, because they wouldn't smell bad until they were much dirtier than I'd like. There's also a bedding called Woody Pet that I've never tried personally, but I've been told by other mouse people that it's very absorbent and odor-controlling.
 
Cedar is a definite no-no. Pine has less of the noxious chemicals that cedar does, but I'd still consider it a no-no. And any clay based cat litter is a no-no as well.

Have I used pine on my rodents before? Yes. But only for a day till I could make the drive to get aspen. I really don't like anything with a strong smell to be used on my pets or feeder animals.

Pine can be gotten away with if its odor isn't overpowering, but even so after prolonged exposure it can damage the cells of the respiratory tract. It just takes it longer than cedar would. So I just don't take the chance.

Not to mention the smell, but every pine litter brand I've tried is insanely dusty, again another bad thing for rodents. Rodents for all of their perceived hardiness have an extremely delicate respiratory system. And prolonged exposure to fine dust particles from the litter, concentrates any chemicals on the wood directly into the lung. And when you have young mice crawling through the litter, it becomes even more health hazardous.

I would stick to a paper based litter (Yesterdays News, Carefresh, PaPurr), Hemp (Lifemate), or Aspen. All are low dust and chemical free. And only having one 10 gallon tank, a large bag of aspen could last 5-6 months I'd venture to say. So it's just as cost effective.

Btw, I would recommend a 20-gallon long for any single colony of mice 1:1 up to a 1:5. More room for them to get exercise, more room in the event of baby mice, and less of an odor issue. Smaller containers tend to stink up faster.
 
graffixcs said:
No pine for snakes, .
Click to expand...

This is what the local pet place uses and what they recomended for my new youngster......my other tank has the repto bark in it......

i know the pine seems somewhat sharp too for such a youngster...should i switch to the repto bark for him as well?
 
Well here is where it is up to you, do a search on repto bark and read what many have to say on that substrate, then do another search on aspen, or one search on bedding. Aspen is without doubt the most recommended bedding, but many use repto bark with few or no problems also.

Don't let anyone say do this or don't do that until you have looked at many discussions as to why. One person will say they love this and hate that, others will argue against it. The bare fact is that no bedding is without some risk.

Personally, I use aspen, and have also used repto bark. I switched because I believe there is less risk with aspen, and it is less expensive in bulk.

I know this isn't the answer you may have been looking for, but it is your snake, and your decision.
 
Most pet places know zilch about the animals they keep and give bad advice. I've heard tons of it, for example, a person purchasing pet rats gets a male and a female, because the pet store person said they can't breed until they're six months old. (for those of you who don't breed, they can reproduce at 4 weeks)
 
i just got some breeder mice i have a 1.4 set up, how long does it take for mice to have baby's once they get pregnant?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top