Thinking about mixing my own food

We use
Bailey's Best British Oats (rolled oats) - 20kg sack for £6.95
Mixed flake (barley, pea, maize etc) - 20kg sack for £7.85
Mixed wild bird seed - 20kg sack for £9.30
Wafcol greyhound maintenance (dry dog food) - 15kg sack for £10.80ish
Lactol soaked bread a couple of times a week

It costs £100 a month to feed 100ish adult mice plus litters, so £1 per mouse per month.

MouseBreeder said:

We use
Bailey's Best British Oats (rolled oats) - 20kg sack for £6.95
Mixed flake (barley, pea, maize etc) - 20kg sack for £7.85
Mixed wild bird seed - 20kg sack for £9.30
Wafcol greyhound maintenance (dry dog food) - 15kg sack for £10.80ish
Lactol soaked bread a couple of times a week

It costs £100 a month to feed 100ish adult mice plus litters, so £1 per mouse per month.

Click to expand...

Cheers

Well i dont have or plan of keeping that many mice at the moment i think i have just under 30 + a litter.

Wild bird seed.
Chicken pellets (small holder range no weird bits in it)
Oat groats.
Canary seed.
Carrots.
Dog biscuit (biscrok/bonio)
Ferret nuggets for Does with pups in limited amounts.
Horse/pig pellets.
Porridge oats.

I have to buy quite a few sacks per month as you can probably imagine But it would be worth it for 30, you'd just not have to buy sacks as often as me (every couple of weeks we buy a few sacks of each of the bulk ingredients, less for things like bird seed and dog food). If you bought one sack of each it would probably last ages But not so long that the food would spoil before you used it.

steve, what is the pig/horse pellets? i am curious.

cait, did used to use a rabbit mix in your own mix? i'm still using a rabbit mix with oats and bird seed and dog kibble added, but there are parts they dont seem like in the rabbit mix...

Pig pellets or horse pellets.

Yes Daisy we did used to use rabbit food in the mix, but only a specific one for that very reason. I have now switched from the rabbit food to the mixed flakes for that part of the mix. I'm not sure if the mice like it as much, it's hard to tell! They definitely eat well anyway. However they all LOVE the Lactol soaked bread. I only just drop it in and they're all in there nibbling :lol:

Mine absolutely love the lactol soaked bread too, they cling to the wire panels when I walk into their garage with lactol!!

I also mix the lactol in with some oats to make them a nice thick porridge type thing which they also love.

I use kitten biscuits and bonio for extra protein, I used to use rat food but have switched to rabbit food as its cheaper for more. They do pick bits out of the rabbit food though! Also have been using linseed recently as its meant to be good for the coat condition.

I used to feed the shunamite diet which was expensive to make up but over time ive removed certain parts and exploring with cheaper alternatives and I haven't noticed any difference in my youngsters development.

sounds all good to me, i guess its just working out what works best for you and yours

steve, i was asking about the pellets as i have horses so it could be cheaper for me to feed if it was worth it, there are so many different kinds of 'horse pellets' that i wonder which type, i would imagine just standard pony nuts. might be something to look into

has anyone else had any experience of feeding horse type food to mice?

ps. my mice also go mental for lactol

Sorry Daisy me thick Dodson & Horrell country cubes around £7 a sack for 20kg.

MouseBreeder said:

We use
Bailey's Best British Oats (rolled oats) - 20kg sack for £6.95
Mixed flake (barley, pea, maize etc) - 20kg sack for £7.85
Mixed wild bird seed - 20kg sack for £9.30
Wafcol greyhound maintenance (dry dog food) - 15kg sack for £10.80ish
Lactol soaked bread a couple of times a week

It costs £100 a month to feed 100ish adult mice plus litters, so £1 per mouse per month.

Click to expand...

where do you get all these in such big sacks Cait? we have been doing ours on a smaller scale and figured it would probably work out so much cheaper for us to buy huge sacks of everything.

I buy them from the 'local' farm shop (not really that local, takes about 30 minutes to get there lol). Anywhere that sells horse feed and things like that near you will probably stock this sort of thing. The oats we buy are actually intended for racehorses :lol: Only the best for the mice! I'm sure a quick Google of 'farm shop' or 'animal feed' or 'equine supplies' will get you some results, especially as you're down south.

im just doing some hunting online Cait and i can only find Baileys Best of British bruised oats? this the same thing?

Yeah that's the same thing. Now I have images of little oats with faces and black eyes lol :lol: You can use any brand of oats though, they are just the ones we have as they are less dusty so don't make us sneeze and itch - they are more expensive as you can buy rolled oats in a sack for about £5 for 20kg.

Bailey's website

The red, white and blue sack are the ones we have...

There is a UK stockists page on there too, might give you a lead in to some places near you as it's done by county.

MouseBreeder said:

Now I have images of little oats with faces and black eyes lol :lol:

Click to expand...

lol Cait :lol:

Mixed flake (barley, pea, maize etc)
right sorry to be a real pain in the bum but ive been doing some more searching for everything you sujested to use,well this 1 is confussling me...all i can find is this...Masham Micronized Feeds Mixed Flakes (Size: 25 kg) whats the brand of the 1 you use Cait?

I'm not sure what the brand is on the mixed flakes, I'd have to check the label. That sounds like you've found the right thing there though - micronized just means cooked I think, and therefore easier to digest