various mouse shots...3-22-07

**Russell** · 03-22-07, 06:01 PM

took a couple mouse shots today while cleaning. First up is the result of pulling babies for weaning with some from last week...man mice add up fast! Had to make another cage to split this bunch in half to let them grow up a bit before freezing. Certainly WAY more than I need just now, but that's ok, soon enough I'll only be keeping them for pinks for the soon to come hatchlings. For a while anyhow...

Then next is a mouse that wasn't born looking like this, but as a weanling I noticed she had a few patches of hair on her body that looked odd. And as she matured she lost more and more hair. Not hairless, but certainly a thin haired mouse!

Then is one of my girls very much pregnant. You can literally feel the little bulges of babies in her when you pick her up! So weird! Yep, I love my albino mice! Very good producers!

Tsiriane · 03-22-07, 06:17 PM

Thats a fat mouse!!

Joni Garcia · 03-22-07, 08:24 PM

What a cute bin of mice! Looks like you must have lots of colonies.

**Russell** · 03-23-07, 05:26 AM

Originally Posted by Tsiriane

Thats a fat mouse!!

uh, NOPE! just very pregnant! he he he...

**Lexcorn** · 03-23-07, 07:17 AM

Good God............I thought that I was bad with the amount of mice that I keep

They sure are 'good producers' as you say.

At least I have the excuse of retaining some for their colours / silky / long coat. I presume that you prefer to produce the white strain?

**Russell** · 03-23-07, 01:52 PM

Originally Posted by Lexcorn

Good God............I thought that I was bad with the amount of mice that I keep

They sure are 'good producers' as you say.

At least I have the excuse of retaining some for their colours / silky / long coat. I presume that you prefer to produce the white strain?

You know, a number of years ago I decided to start raising rodents again in a big way. And cut back on the number of birds. So I had a friend build a big wooden stand that is six levels high and I don't remember exact dimensions wide, but it houses four tubs on every level, and then there are tubs on the floor underneath. Mice take up half and the top shelf. Rats take over the rest. I maintain two male rats and then let the females have their own tub when they have babies. So I'm always rotating females through the male's tubs. Mice I run 1.5 to a tub.

Anyhow, when I first started out I had some mice from John Meltzer, who's maintained a huge colony for about twenty years now. They were neat looking blue and white things. Then I stopped in at a pet store and got some they had in a tank. Brindle mice. And then a stop to Petco found a group of white mice in a cage and I asked an employee where they get their mice. And he told me Gourmet Rodent. So I picked up 1.3 of those.

I get home and the Meltzer mice are the first to produce, and eat their babies...and produce...and eat half their babies... Well, the Meltzer line was not doing good for me, so they didn't last even four months I think. The Brindle line was around here till about a year ago when I finally stopped having any. Very pretty mice, but they tend to get very obese and I don't like that. But they produced well for me.

Just over a year ago I got some satin mice in. They were pretty, but didn't produce all that large a litter, and their babies would be on the runty side, thin and underfed no matter how well I tried to keep numbers in a litter down.

These white things... That first bunch seemed to take forever to start producing in comparison to the other lines. But oh man, it's like a powerful storm, that builds and builds and suddenly it pours! I find now the strain I have produces sooner than in the past. I have problems with if there are already a bunch of babies in the tub, any new pinkies are eaten. Not always, but I've seen it often enough. Think Misty said it best the other night, it's like their own population control. Which I'd enact anyway, cause I don't like to have new pinks in with say, hoppers or large fuzzies. Cause the pinks likely won't get fed as well and then be runty. I like my mice well grown through all stages. So yes, they are just albino mice, but I love them. They produce very well for me.

Plus when I was a kid, I remember being in the pet store looking at a cage full of white mice. And feeling jealous of the girl I saw buy a handful and was playing with them. Back then, in my parents home, I was NOT allowed to have any other pet than fish. So I could only look at all the animals and dream of someday having my own group of animals. Funny I now have tons and tons of my own white mice! So I actually do think these albinos are pretty. Plus this way I don't see them for individuals as far as color I'm trying to produce, but rather what group is producing very well and hold back according to production not a pretty color. Cause they all have the same color so that never becomes a factor in how I choose new colonies.

For me this hobby is more than just the snakes, it's also maintaining a rodent colony. All started back in college working in the live reptile lab that also maintained it's own mouse colony. Guess what my primary job there was?