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When to remove pinkies

claireree

claireree

New member
I have two cages of breeding mice and upto now I have only been feeding my young mice to my snakes but now I have 17 eggs in a incubator and a young corn still on pinkies. I have purchased some frozen mice but would like to use some of mine as well as I have quite a few at the moment.

Anyway does anyone have any tips on when to remove the pinkies and the best way to do it, I have checked one litter today when the mum wasnt in and took some out but when I checked later she was moving some, dont want to risk them hurting the remaining ones.
 
i used to find that i had to remove them all. people always told me not to take them all,but i often found that the mothers would eat the ones i left. so i did take the rest out, at least you have them for future feeds then.
 
I seem to be having problems breeding mice, as they just don't seem to want to start breeding.

My rats however are no problem and I just take what I want from their litters with no apparent problems for the remaining babies. The mothers spend a while looking for their missing babies after I remove them, but soon settle down with what's left of their litters, if anything. I also find that female rats will share the babies with each other, as I keep 1 male and 3 or 4 females in large cages. With 4 females in a cage, I usually find two extremely large clusters of babies with all females sharing 'mothering' duties.

Another issue I find is that if females are left with part of their litters, they will not breed again until all babies have left. For this reason I like to remove all babies if possible, unless I need to grow some to a larger size.
 
Thanks that is a help, I have removed some out of a nest and shortly after that two of the mums removed the rest into another hide they have but they all seem happy in there, I do have another mum in another house but have not disturbed her will leave her ones for feeding my bigger snakes when they are bigger as she is a lot more nervous.

Both my litters are quite established now and dont seem to be having any problems breeding which is a good thing.
 
I've never had a problem with harvesting some and leaving the rest. Mothers who eat more than their first litter get culled, as they clearly have bad genes.
 
I have my own mice colonies as well... and I do take out some pinkies,,, day one, day two and day three... that way I have varieties of different size pinkies.... I usually find that if I am very calm and take some/most of the pinkies, the mothers usually don't feakout too often... they might move their babies to a different location within their settings, but the only time I lose some babies is when mothers can't move all of their babies... maybe one or two gets lost in the move inside the shavings, I dunno... but I have already read somewhere that if you take all of the babies, moms gets in trouble with the milk production and no babies...

I do have some efficient producers and non-efficient producers.. so I don't know if I am saving any money by having my own colonies, but it is sure nice to have the right size pinkies when I need them... especially if I need a live pinky to force feed the non-feeders...

*I always appologise when I take the babies though... tried to look at them at feeders... like picking tomatoes or something.... ** :p

I am still learning myself so I want to keep in touch with this thread..:)

Cheers,
Rebecca
 
There are a few misconceptions here. Velvet said it best, only keep good mothers. If she eats her young or doesn't produce enough milk to raise robust babies, feed her off, always. Don't use her babies for future breeders. Take your future breeders from your very best mothers. Do that repeatedly and in 5 or 10 generations you'll have really productive colonies.

Don't take all the babies. If the mother has nobody to nurse she will develop mammary problems with future litters. If I am harvesting pinkies, I will take all but 5 of the babies and let the mom raise them through weanling size. If you have eggs in the incubator, you will want to be collecting day old pinkies right now. 3 or 4-day-old pinks are too big.

The female mouse comes into estrus about 2 or 3 hours after giving birth. If the male is present, she will breed and will be pregnant all during the three weeks she is nursing the first batch. About the time the first batch is old enough to wean, she will give birth to another batch and two hours later breed again. Your mouse production will not be sped up or slowed down weather she is nursing or not.

I know it’s tough to kill baby mice. I think hopper size mice are the cutest and I hate killing them. At some point you need to decide if you are raising mice or snakes. If you are raising snakes, you need to feed them.
 
Brilliant that really helps, does anyone have any tips and killing them nicely, I was told the best way with the pinkies is to put them straight in the freezer.
 
I put them directly in the freezer. Some folks will tell you that is wrong and the CO2 gas is the only way to go. That may be true but not very practical on a small scale like you are talking. Pinkies die very quickly in the freezer.
 
Actually, it is best to remove ALL of the pinks or almost none....if production is a major concern. If you remove all of them, the mother will re-breed quickly if she wasn't bred at the right time for the postpartum ovulation. If you remove some, she will likely not rebred until those last ones left are weaned. If she was already re-bred, it doesn't matter....but it certainly does if she wasn't!

Sometimes rabbits will get problems if all of the babies are "hard weaned" off at the wrong time, but this really isn't that valid of a concern with mice.

KJ
 
I always have 4 females with one male in a box.

I leave the first litter from one mom untouched.
Then all other can than be taken out at when needed.

When that first litter has grown then the next litter will be untouched and the ones right after can be taken out again.

This way I have no problem that the rest of the pinkies get eaten, or that the mom got milk over.

Another advantage is that the second/third mom will then also feed the first litter, making them grow quicker and get stronger.
 
more great help. I know it all takes a bit of time and effort but over here in Spain the condition of mice in pet shops is not very good, think they tend to know people mainly buy them for feeders so they are not too bothered which is why I have decided to breed my own they are so much more healthier and tend to get spoilt with loads of our food scraps.

It is so much easier as well when I know my snakes need feeding I can just go and pick one rather than have to go round loads of diff pet shops to see if they have any.
 
claireree said:
I have decided to breed my own they are so much more healthier and tend to get spoilt with loads of our food scraps.
Click to expand...

You can raise you own and make them very healthy but don't give them table scraps. Too many vegetables or leafy greens of any kind will give them diarrhea. Mice get over weight very easily and our food is way too high in fat content. Meat should be used very sparingly.

I feed mine a mixture of several grains, corn, wheat, milo, oats, some black oil sunflower seeds, and a low fat dry cat food for protein. I also add 22% protein turkey pellets. I never give then table scraps of any kind.
 
oh ok thanks for that, I have started mixing my own food as well as when I go and get mice food it seems to be mainly sunflower seeds, they tend to get similiar to you but also add budgie millet (think thats what is called) and cornflakes with dry dog biscuits.

They dont get table scraps every day mainly weekend the odd bit of potatoe and a bit of veg but not all the time mainly as a treat, they have to fight for it and share it with my dogs as well.
 
wade said:
I also add 22% protein turkey pellets. QUOTE]

Is Turkey pellets safe to give to mice and then to snakes? I thought most of the poultry pellets have medications in them... Maybe it was just for the baby poultries, but Turkey I thought carried through with the meds in their food because they are weaker or more prone to sickness than chickens?? Sorry if I am wrong here.. been many years since I raised poultries, so it might be different now:shrugs:

I was looking into getting horse feed/pellets so that is why I am asking.. thanks for any info again..:)

Cheers
Click to expand...
 
I can't get lab blocks unless I use an on-line supplier, I was getting frustrated by the wastage from al the seed mixes I tried, so I went to a feed store and got a huge bag of pig pellets. The mice went crazy over them, and are producing bigger litters now, averaging 15 pinkies, of which I usually cull 10 at a day old then grow on the others in preparation for my (fingers crossed) hatchling corns
 
RebeccaK said:
Is Turkey pellets safe to give to mice and then to snakes? I thought most of the poultry pellets have medications in them...

I was looking into getting horse feed/pellets so that is why I am asking.. thanks for any info again..:)

Cheers
Click to expand...

[: dumb look on my face :] I don't know. I'm not real organically inclined. I eat chemicals in all my food and feel like my mice should as well. Sorry, I don't have a better answer.

Horse pellets will be high in alfalfa. Janines idea of pig pellets might be better. That would be mostly grains.
 
When I couldn't find rodent food at the feed store, they recommended the sow pellets because they have some rat breeders who swear by them
 
[: dumb look on my face too:] With Chickens, they put tiny ammount of Coccidiosis stuff in their babies feed/pellets (to make them have ammunity(sp?) and I thought that was one that you didn't want your snake getting close to.. I never raised Turkey, so I don't know what is in their feed, but that is what I meant... not being organic.. ;)

I will try the sow pellets and see if the mice will eat them... :) Thanks for the info~!!

Back to the pinky topic, I once tried putting other female's pinky in with a new mom.. and she ate the ones I put in. I really don't enjoy that part of raising pinkies for my snakes...

Cheers,
 
brilliant will try the sow pellets as well, just need to find out how to explain what I need in spanish to my man at the local ferrateria. should be fun haha
 
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