[fuzzymom]

I usually feed my mice and rats Mazuri 6F lab block as their main diet. I also like to add other foods for them to munch on like oats, fresh fruits and veggies, and they sometimes enjoy baby food. They absolutely enjoy licking baby food off a spoon. So what would be a good ratio of block, fresh foods, and treats? What is the general rule about cooked foods ("people food"). I do not have any mice right now. I only have two rats that I will be breeding when they are old enough. (They are currently 6-7 weeks old). I will also be getting another pair of rats so the female will have another female cage mate and the male will have a cage mate.

I'm trying to hand tame these rats and eventually when I have breeder mice, I would like them to be handled on a regular basis as well.

 

[fuzzymom]

While I would love to breed nicer mice, pet store mice are the only kind I can get around here. I don't know any mouse breeders in my area and those that do breed mice to supply the pet stores with feeders, I don't particularly care for. (unhealthy mice and rats, low weights, sickly). The only healthy mice I've ever gotten in the area came from Petco. These mice looked healthy, ate well, had good weights and began breeding without problems.

I like mazuri 6f because I can get it in a 50lb bag for about $55 shipped and that lasts me a long time, especially now when I only have a few rats to feed and when I move I will probably only start off with a few breeding mice. Thanks for your reply. Now with kitten food, is there a specific brand you use? Would adult cat food work just as well or are the protein and fat content too different?

 

[fuzzymom]

On my next day off I will head up to the tractor supply store that says they carry Mazuri and see if they carry 6f or could order some in for me. How does Rodent Breeder differ from Mazuri 6f? Is it just higher protein? Would it be a good diet for both mice and rats?

I really can't wait till I move. As soon as we are settled in I'm going to go on the hunt for good quality mice. I don't breed for show but quality healthy animals are important.

 

[fuzzymom]

Oh trust me, I'm a camera happy person. I take pictures of my fur kids whenever I can. I actually have pictures of when I used to breed mice and rats a while back. Then I brought a feeder home for one of my snakes, she refused so the rat sat in a spare tank near the snakes but I guess I wasn't as careful as I thought I was and I lost a lot of my rats due to some kind of illness. A breeder told me it was something called Mycos and that killed off many of my favorite rats. After losing them I couldn't bring myself to really breed like that until now. And I will have quarantine practices in place when I start breeding so that doesn't happen again and lots of sanitizing and probably even taking showers between caring for rejected feeders/new mice and rodents and the existing breeding rats/mice. I don't want that to ever happen again. :evil:

But if you'd like to see pictures of the rats and mice I used to have, I'd be happy to post them.

 

[fuzzymom]

Well after a few days of having that feeder rat, he started to display very odd symptoms. He began moving his head around in a very strange way. When I asked some breeders about this they said it was something called mycoplasmosis, which can affect different areas of the body. It can go to the brain, causing neurological problems, as it did with this rat. It can also go to the respiratory system and genitals. We had a black hood dumbo male named Monk. He was our favorite and the first sign for him was the first litter he sired. He wasn't acting sick or anything but the first litter he sired was very very small. I believe I only got 2-3 pups from it and they died pretty early on. Then he got really sick really fast. It had hit his respiratory system and we stayed up with him till he passed away. It was pretty bad and by the time we realized what it was, we had lost quite a few rats. The feeder rat died a day or two before Monk did.

So this time, I'm going to do it right. Quarantine is a must, sanitizing EVERYTHING, and proper quarantine practices will be in place so that this will never happen again. I want my mice and rats to be healthy, happy, and spoiled rotten.