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Would You Be...

PikaBun

PikaBun

Ex-pet shop girl
Would you be insulted, thrilled, or something else if your dad came by to visit your appartment and upon seeing your thriving rodent breeding colonies (ASF rats) offered to pay you $25 a month to get rid of them and buy pre-packed frozen rodents? Should I laugh or cry? :poke:

I mean I like rodents as pets, I like knowing exactly what they are eating before feeding them to my snakes...but I don't like spending so much time on cage cleaning, euthanizing etc.
 
wstphal said:
Would $25/month buy you enough pre-frozen?
Click to expand...

Also, what do you spend in food each month for the rodents?

You would be saving that money, and then getting another $25/mo for frozen. The actual gain could be $35/mo, or more...but I can't do this math for you.

Also, life is NOT about money. Don't let people fool you into thinking it is. Some people have more time than they do money...while others have more money than they do time. The average person has more time than money, and will usually try to do it himself in order to save some cash. Whereas the person with more money than time would rather pay someone else to do it so they could be more productive with their time.

Personally, I would actually get frozen and give up the rodent collection if the money difference was not substantial. So for me, even if it didn't save me money, the reduced work would be worth it up to a point. There is a price point where I would just rather do it myself, but never to save a mere $10 a month...

I would have to save more than $40-50 per month to ever take on the responsiblilty of raising my own rodents...

However as a breeder, I would need to save even more. My time as a breeder of snakes is more important than my time as a breeder of food for those snakes. Obviously, I would have to run the numbers, and make a decision afterwards...I am just thinking out loud...
 
Yeah, Nroc that's along the lines my thoughts were going. I've been breeding rodents for 12 months now and have alot more snakes then I did before that 12 months so I am not sure what my monthly frozen bill would look like (if every snake got one prey item at $1 per then each months bill would be ~$90). As for rodent costs: food ~$50 of food lasts 2-3 months and a bale of shavings is $9 and lasts 3-4 months. 20 mins a day for feeding and checking water bottles. 20 mins a week to clean each tank (x8). Plus time spent catching the rodents of the right size and putting them down, packing in the freezer. Hmmm...
 
I think I will retire the majority of rodent breeding as I am in a smaaaall appartment and it takes alot of space. Keeping one group will be handy for providing pinkies, fuzzies and hoppers but it will be much easier to buy frozen adults off another hobbiest I think. Now I will have to find some frozen prices.
 
Would you be insulted, thrilled, or something else
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It may be more a reflection on the way my family works, but I'm pretty sure I'd be mad as hell and tell my Dad to mind his own business while he's in my apartment!

If you're living an independent life, do you really need to be beholden to your parents again? Even for frozen mice? If breeding is costing more than buying frozen, or is taking up too much of your time, then it makes sense to move to frozen.

Perhaps I'm too cussed for my own good, but what doesn't make sense is allowing your Dad to make the decision for you and then handing him over control of your snakes' food supply.
 
I'm not sure how many snakes you have Mila, but I know for me, it's definately cost effective to breed my own mice. Occasionally I have had to buy more mice, but in the long run, I have saved money by breeding my own. I kind of enjoy the mice too. My costs run simular to your costs, I maybe spend a bit more on shavings as mice tend to need cleaning more than ASF's, but add say $10 more than your costs.
I also like having live at my disposal, as I have one snake that only eats live, and occasionally I will feed one of my younger snakes a live peach fuzzy. I'm sure you already know Judica's prices at Coast to Coast. Personally, she would be my choice if I was going to be buying, as she is close to you, and I think she even delivers down to Victoria. Her prices seem to be fairly competative, perhaps a tad higher, but when you factor in shipping costs and quality, I think she's pretty good.
 
Well Bitsy, I was a bit mad at my dad for butting in but he explained it as, 'not wanting to find me dead, alone, like some crazy cat lady with my animals knawing on my corpse' - something like that anyways which made me laugh. The fact is all the rodents are in my bedroom...infact everything but the cats live in my bedroom so it is kinda stuffy with 8 rodent colonies...stpid small apartment. I will re-expand the rodent colonies if I get to move into a house (hopefully SOON but not looking likely financially).

I was buying Coast-to-Coast mice previous to ASFs. Lets see how many snakes now...20? No, 25...I think.
 
PikaBun said:
dad offered to pay you $25 a month to get rid of them and buy pre-packed frozen rodents? Should I laugh or cry? :poke:
Click to expand...

Does Dad have an aversion to the rodents? An allergy perhaps, or he's not fond of his lil Princess having a bedroom full of rats? Is Dad offering to buy the frozen food and give you $25. per month? At face value, it looks like Dad is uncomfortable with you having living rodents around, perhaps discussing it more with him will help you understand him, and help him to understand you, and, your desire to have a bedroom full of rats. Could you use the space and time and energy and money (saved if you go with Dad's plan) for something else? (more reptile pets)... I understand where there's some emotional attachment to the ASF project; No need to make a decision right now, this instant, today. Maybe some time to think it over before getting back to him on that is necessary.
 
PikaBun said:
Yeah, Nroc that's along the lines my thoughts were going. I've been breeding rodents for 12 months now and have alot more snakes then I did before that 12 months so I am not sure what my monthly frozen bill would look like (if every snake got one prey item at $1 per then each months bill would be ~$90). As for rodent costs: food ~$50 of food lasts 2-3 months and a bale of shavings is $9 and lasts 3-4 months. 20 mins a day for feeding and checking water bottles. 20 mins a week to clean each tank (x8). Plus time spent catching the rodents of the right size and putting them down, packing in the freezer. Hmmm...
Click to expand...

You would not pay anywhere close to $1 per item.

Give me an idea of what you feed in a single week, and I can run some numbers for you. How many pinkies, how many fuzzies, any adult mice? Most of the time, it's recommended to store only 6 months worth of food at a time. If it's vacuum sealed, you may get a year out of it. I'll make the assumption that you have a variety of snake ages, and give you a variety of feeder sizes.

I am using The Mouse Factory for the prices, as many here speak highly of their quality compared to a lot of the other places.

200 pinkies $44
200 fuzzies $64
200 adult mice $130

That is 600 servings, and will last you 6 months. Your shipping should be $65 or less based on their calculator.

This comes out to $50.50 per month to feed 26 snakes assuming that 1/3 of them are adults feeding on adult mice. If you have fewer adults, and need more pinkies or fuzzies, or anything smaller, then your costs will go DOWN from here.

If you can get me some real numbers, I can tweak this for you, or you can do it yourself if you like. Just know that you are going to price out based on a 500-1000 volume quantity when you do this. If you buy a year's worth, you will move up to the next volume discount level of 1000+, and your shipping costs will only go up like $10, instead of doubling.

I would ask your father for a Foodsaver vacuum sealer, and about $50 per month for the mice, and then, you will get rid of the mice colonies. That's my suggestion. Just keep in mind that those 26 snakes will all be adults one day, and your frozen costs will go up...but at the same time, could you provide enough adult mice for them out of your colonies once that happens?
 
I just remembered that you are in Canada...I have no idea what that will do to the numbers I just gave you. I still think that $1 per item is high...even with the whole Canada thing...

The one point I will make again is that once your snakes are grown, will you be able to supply 26 adult mice every 7-10 days from your colonies? I don't know how mice breeding works, so this may be a stupid question. I do know that it takes about 30-40 days to reach adulthood though. Can you keep up with your snakes as they become adults?
 
Canadian pricing locally ~ for 100 Lot Combo:
~Retired Breeders $1.10
~Mice $1.00
~Weanlings $0.90
~Hoppers $0.80
~Fuzzies $0.70
~Pinkies $0.60
------Delivery free :)
Drop 15 cents off each for the 500 lot pricing. I don't think my freezer can hold more then 200 mice at a time - it's a 2/3 size fridge of crap (gotta have room for icecream afterall) :roflmao:

Currently my biggest corn is a female at 770 grams, over 4.5 feet long, and she is very happy to eat 80 grams of rodent every 14 days (though sometimes she gets fed every 21 days). That's usually a single ex-breeder ASF rat. She is very lean too, not chubby at all. She would take 140 grams of ASF easily if I let her (she makes begging stares at me within 3 days of eating). Other then her I have 6 snakes eating over 30 grams, then 9 eating from 16-30 grams, the rest (9) eating 12 grams or less.
 
Mila, if you do decide to buy mice, just let me know when you are ready to order, because we can pool our orders (there are a few up here in Comox I always pick up mice for) to bring the order number up to the 500 combo price. Let me know also if you plan to get rid of your ASF's. I may very well want to buy more off you.
 
I won't get rid of all my ASFs (but Don Patterson certainly wants any frozen ones, lol).

If we pool a mouse order how would we sort out the delivery bit? Or would you be picking up your part personally and the rest for me would come down with Coast-to-Coast on their weekly delivery?
 
PikaBun said:
I won't get rid of all my ASFs (but Don Patterson certainly wants any frozen ones, lol).

If we pool a mouse order how would we sort out the delivery bit? Or would you be picking up your part personally and the rest for me would come down with Coast-to-Coast on their weekly delivery?
Click to expand...

I'd pick up my part and I'm pretty sure Judica would deliver your portion of the order. I would verify that with her in advance, but I don't think that is a problem with her.
 
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