Ok, so Suki had her babies, er, baby, last night/this morning. And... she killed it. Either she or Twix, but either way it's dead. I am a bit disappointed, but not disgusted or sad. It's not worse than watching my cat bring home dinner... I think if she doesn't have any more babies I will try breeding her sister, Twix. Any suggestions?
*edit* Suki seems fine, but I am waiting to see if she has any more babies. Should I not bother her? She is hunched over, I am not sure if she is still delivering, or something else. It's been about 40 minutes since I found the dead pinky, could she still be having babies?! :!: :shock: It was quite a shock to find the dead pinky. I was so sure that with Suki's sweet docile temperment, she would be fine. But maybe the sound of my other mouses loud running wheels stressed her out, or something else. But I really want to know which one is the murderer...
*edit* Again, Suki seems fine. No more hunching over, just running around with Twix.
She's not ok any more. She hasn't eaten or drunk in two days, since birth. And I put Twix with Blaze, so Suki is all alone. She is lethargic and sluggish, not like her normal perky self. Help?
Feralwolf are you sure she just had one baby she may of had more through the night and ate them too or were you watching her all night.Its a thing that can happen its sad just try again.
Sorry to worry y'all. Suki is eating, now that Twix is back with her. I feel bad though, because Twix is going to be with Blaze for two to two and half weeks! She'll be all alone. I have another lonely female, Amber, and I was thinking of putting them together for that time. I know they get along nicely, but when I split them up, the one who ends up alone will be sad. I would put them all together, but Twix is aggressive to all but Suki. Suki is a new mouse when Twix is there. The food is half gone, in about two hours. And it wasn't Twix who ate it!!
I put Amber with Suki in a traveling cage just to see how they would get along. Squeaking at the beginning, but now it's all quiet and they are grooming eachother. Here are some pics.
I cleaned out Suki's cage so they could be in there without here scent to influence their behavior. As soon as they were in... BAM!! Tons of squeaking, tail rattling and wrestling. I was hoping that they would get along. But now they are in their separate cages, and Twix is with Suki. I just hope that when I get some new young mice, Amber will be good so she can have a cagemate.
I had this with a doe I introduced to two other does a week or so ago - I put them all together into a clean cage with enrichment moved around so none of them would see it as their territory, and there was a lot of squeaking for the first day but it quickly settled. I think even with females they need to sort out who's boss. Maybe try her with Amber again but give them a bit longer to settle down? As long as they're not getting injured they should be ok until you can gage whether the scuffles will continue
Mice are social animals, so if they are injured or sick, you do not want to remove the other cage mates, unless they are the cause of the injury. You may remove sick animals to put to sleep, but still quarantine cage mates. But if its something like an inner ear infection or something that is not necessarily going to be spread, it is more beneficial to leave the cage mates in the tank.
When you say they will be sad when they are alone, you are right. Being alone causes mice stress, and can weaken their immune system and their ability to fight off diseases or deal with injuries.
Out of curiosity, why don't you have Twix, Amber, and Suki all in the same cage together? In my largest cage right now, I have 10 females cohabiting peacefully. If I add a new one to the group their is some squeaking while they establish hierarchy in the deem, but in the end everyone settles down.
The reason the two females started fighting again was because you cleaned their cage, and they had to re-establish their order because all of the scents were gone. Leave them together, and don't hover over them being paranoid and nervous. As long as no one is causing any serious injuries, then there is no need to remove either of the females. They will settle down with a little time.
The reason I haven't put them all together is that Twix is aggressive to Amber. For some reason, she can't stand her. But I wonder if she was just setting the order. Twix has always been dominant, but maybe if I left them together for a while, they'd be ok. And you're right, I do hover over them. A lot. I will try soon to put all three girls together, and see how it goes.
So both your females don`t get on now? I thought your plan was to breed one and then put her back with her sister? I have to agree with nuediamice that a female who is used to being with another female/females, should`nt be suddenly left alone. Breeding aside, your puting her through un-necessary stress by shifting things about. The first rule of breeding is to make sure the mice are not stressed. Because you only have two females, it means you either should have bred both to your single male and kept the pregnant females together and removed the male, or made sure you had three or four females to begin with, so that they always had company of their own gender.
Messing around with seperating them could make your females ill and as you have seen, not get on again when re-introduced. This should always be priority if you are going to breed mice. Their welfare is key if you are to have happy, healthy, contented mice.
There are three females. Two get along. One doesn't get along with one of the other two. Suki, Twix, and Amber are females. Blaze is the male. FeralWolf very much seems to have their welfare in mind. If anything, she's trying too hard to avoid fights between a pair of does who just don't get on well.
my trick for fighting girls is to put the two enemies alone together for a couple of days, mice rather make friends than be cold and alone, beggars can't be choosers an all that sort of thing, then reintroduce the third girl when things settle
I had them together for three days, and then one night they were really going at it (they are SO loud!) and I split them up for the sake of my mental health, and also I didn't want them to get hurt. Suki has been alone, but gradually getting better and better. She has been eating normally and drinking too, so I hope that once everyone is back to normal, I will again try to introduce them.
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