3 live mice

[liltattyprinces]

I recieved 2 female 1 male mice yesterday i set them up in a tank, but i know nothing about breeding mice i can't stand them...lol..can i leave them all together? i do have 2 other cages available when the need arises, but i am not sure what to do once they have babies i bought food and put a water dish in what else do i kneed to know, thanks in advance

Laura-Lee L

[tai_pan1]

Thats it, just make sure they have fresh water everyday, and food. Clean the cage weekly. One cage is fine, a single male can service 5 or 6 females. Leave the babies in the cage. New mothers may have more problems than an experienced mother and may tend to be more nervous. She may even eat her first litter. Don't be alarmed, let nature take it's course and you'll have plenty of snake food in no time. I started my colony in December at 1.3, I now have several colonies (1@ 1.5, 2 @ 1.3) and about 10 pounds of mice in my freezer. I am also feeding 5 corns, so I've "processed" a lot of snake food in 9 months.

Have fun!

Mike

[liltattyprinces]

Is it ok to just pick them up by the tails cuz i hate touching them they creep me out.. give a 5 ft snake bigger than me and no prob a little mouse and i'm a compleate baby btw my Father is going to modify a mouse trap for me to kill them is that ok ?or is it easier to just wack them on the coffee table?

[sapphire_moon]

if you wack them on the table be sure to have them in a bag!!!!!

[Linds]

Mouse traps are a painful way for the mice to go. Easy just to wack em.

Its fine to tail them. LOL...if you try the other way you will probably get bit, nasty little buggers :rolleyes:

As forementioned by Mike, its best just to leave the colony intact, Mice are sensitive and removing them and juggling them around can easily upset them, and even if it doesn't it will be counterproductive. Don't add new members if there are babies in the tank.... babies will get eaten and other may get hurt or killed as well. If you can get a water bottle its even better, they like to fill up the dish pretty fast with shavings. If they take a while to start reproducing don't worry about it. As I said, they are finicky and sensitive and can take a while to get started :rolleyes:

[marisa]

Agreed with everyone else.

Leave the colony together as long as they are breeding for you. Example....you buy 1 male 2 females (1.2) and set them up. This will be your colony. You cannot remove the male, or add new mice to this group. Even during birthing and what not, leave them together. Males are good fathers, and females don't like new members to the group. If you want a larger group start out with one. :D

And yes it will take a bit of time for them to settle in and start breeding. When I set up new colonies it takes from 1 month-3 months. After 3 months or so you can assume something else is wrong but normally they always start up before this.

All they need is a clean cage, plenty of fresh water and food and time. :D

Marisa

[liltattyprinces]

i went and got a watter bottle for them, and they are quite friendly trying to crawl on my hands and stuff when i was in the tank. What about cleaning the tank after they have babies should i wait til their a certain age?

[marisa]

Maybe for the first litter but after that it doesn't really matter. I clean my tanks regardless of how old the babies are. Normally I just move the adults, the scoop up the babies, nest and all and place them into the clean cage.

Marisa