Sperm retention with mice?!

[SnakeAround]

I think it sounds weird, but 2 and maybe even 3 of my mommy mice (with litter still) look like they are pregnant again and no male was put in with them after giving birth!!!! I suppose I could maybe forget about a little moment of putting a male with them, but I'm about 99,99% sure I didn't, besides that, 2 of them are housed separated from the third mommy, and I'm 100% sure about not putting a male with those 2, they were housed together from the day they looked pregnant and I did not ever put in any male mouse for a second with them!!! So if they got pregnant without a male, I guess the 3rd one wasn't a forgotten moment of a male being with them.....

I hope I don't sound retarded, and surely hope it happened with others or I seriously have to consider that I'm a lunatic or have seriously declining memory functions... or a scientific threefold wonder occured :crazy02:

 

[Baba-Lou]

well you never know. have they made babies before though. when there was no Male in there? Thats the question. It is totally possible. but I know I had a female when I was younger who always looked like she was pregnant. But never had babies. So I don't know.

 

[SnakeAround]

Well, for 2 of the mommy's this was their first litter, for the other the second. They got back almost to their normal girthwide after throwing their babies, but now they get bigger and bigger with the typical bulges from being pregnant, no doubt about it... Did you ever here of it before?

 

[denowt]

Was the male left in with up until birth then removed? I've seen my males jumping on the females a day or so BEFORE they give birth. I don't know if he is doing any good that soon though. He will usually jump on them a day before through the day after or so.

 

[cornmorphs]

i had this happen last year.
it was the biggest litter i have ever seen which was 33, and everyone told me it was impossible lol.

 

[denowt]

33 from one mouse???
WOW!!!
I was happy when a couple of mine had 13 when the rest were averaging 10.
I can't imagine how big she must have been.

 

[cornmorphs]

yeah i know. i've had 3 of 30 or more in the years i have bred.
they were all high quality lab mice though.

 

[Baba-Lou]

Haha my females made 30 this time around in total...and there was 3 of them lol

 

[SnakeAround]

So, I'm not the only one at least.... but these are 3 miraculous preggies!

The pregnant mice were separated from the man when they definitely looked like they were pegnant. So I think about 1,5 weeks after the mating. I didn't put any male with them after the seperation....

I hope some experienced mouse breeder pops up to reply...

 

[SnakeAround]

It looks like one of the 3 supposed to be preg. mommy's is slimming down! I separated her from the other mommy and put her with the female weaners (only 4 out of 12 critters left) from the 2 litters they brought up together. I wanted her to have less physical stress from taking care of 2 litters with another mommy but had to separate the weaners by sexe too. Since the day of separation it looks like her belly is slimming and close to normal size now?! The other 2 pregnant mommy's (separate from the ones mentioned above) still get bigger but not as big as from their previous litter and also not really symmetrical; both have different sized flanks. They didn't when they were pregnant before. I know from 1 of the mommy's that had a litter with me before, that she didn't get bigger after giving birth....

Does anybody have any idea what can be going on? Do mommy mice sometimes get bigger and bigger belly's after giving birth without being pregnant? Is it possible that the slimming mommy actually gave birth but ate them cause there still were critters from the prev. litter around? Seems odd to me....