Breeding feeder mice

[Sherry]

Written by josie'smom:

Hi all!
Didn't want this section to go completely blank... I don't have a question, just some info.

I am currently busy trying to establish my own feeder colony of mice. Am also feeding the mice as "naturally" as I can, so they grow as healthy as they can!

I feed apples, potatoes, alfalfa cubes, sunflower seeds, oats, crickets, superworms, chicken bones and jerkified meats.

So far I have four mouse houses, harboring two dozen individuals. Mostly female adults and juveniles. Two breeding studs get to visit the girls every couple weeks.

I've had four litters born so far but one litter was recently eaten. Surprisingly enough they were eaten late in their life cycle as fuzzies, not newborns, and were eaten by a "nanny" who was pregnant herself.

This has caused me to revise my grouping and I am in the process of establishing different housing for them. Currently I am utilizing 3 hamster habitrails and one tank enclosure.

I cull the male juveniles while they are still fuzzies. This allows the females to grow stronger and takes stress off the mommas. Each of the litters born has been around ten pups! ANd almost a 50/50 split of male to females.

One recent catastrophe was that my deaf flyong ferret Crytal managed to get into what I thought was a relatively safe nursery and she decimated that colony! WHich was fairly large because the container was a huge rubbermaid tub!

She was quite pleased with her accomplishment and had her hard won prizes all stacked up neatly in the corner of the bin when I caught her!

Needless to say the four stacked up mice were ALL pregnant! Ah well, live and learn!

Mice make great food packets for the ferrets. Live mice offer the ferrets supreme enrichment and an outlet for their inner predator! Feeding the live mice has been a key element in eliminating Fizzle's propensity to staple human flesh!

Cheers, Kim

[RedSky]

How do you 'cull' the male mice?
I am in the UK and it is illegal here to feed live vertebrates. Thought it may be worth adding in since you said that live feeding can be enriching for the ferrets.

[katt]

Natural Diet: holisticferret60.proboards.com/thread/3182/natural-mouse-diet

RE culling, you can use a CO2 chamber, or cervical dislocation.

This thread under Live Feeding demonstrates how to do a cervical dislocation on small rodents. (WARMING: GRAPHIC CONTENT)

holisticferret60.proboards.com/thread/13333/perform-cervical-dislocation

[Deleted]

Oct 15, 2013 10:44:20 GMT -5 RedSky said:

How do you 'cull' the male mice?
I am in the UK and it is illegal here to feed live vertebrates. Thought it may be worth adding in since you said that live feeding can be enriching for the ferrets.

Its not illegal to feed live. It can just be frouned upon. 

[RedSky]

I have always been told (even when working in a reptile house and bird of prey section of a small zoo/rare breeds farm) that it is illegal in the UK unless everything else has been tried and the animal is at risk of starvation. Although it shouldn't be left so long that the predator is too weak to make a quick and clean kill. Also it should not be publicised in anyway.
But yes, from a quick google I cannot find anything to say that it is actually illegal, as long as the animals do not suffer unnecessarily, which if they are found to do then that is obviously plain and simple animal abuse. This of course on this forum is covered by the point that feeders are advised to watch and step in if the kill is taking too long.