Reptile & Amphibian Forums

My 2nd female just gave birth to 13 healthy pinks. The first female gave birth to 9 with 1 stillborn 9 days ago. Here are pics of both litters.

The older litter at 9 days weigh 6-7 grams. Newborns weigh 2 grams or so.

Nice looking litters! I would really like to find some of them, but up here in Washington state I have had no luck! Thanks for the pictures.

Congrats. Are the mothers still docile/reasonable?

DeMak

The mothers never were docile or reasonable. The first one started biting almost immediately after I set up the colony. The 2nd female started biting a couple weeks after I got her. Perhaps its a hormonal thing when they are pregnant, but they bite a lot, and hard. I have been using cheap dollar store gardening gloves but I need to find something tougher.

I'm hoping the new pups will be more docile if I put some effort into socializing them from birth.

Out of the trio I have, the male & one female hide from me. They cower in the corner, trying to dig under each other for protection every time I go near them.

The other female, however, is friendly! I don't push too much, I normally just reach in the cage once or twice a day, and pet her once or twice each time, but she comes right up to me, the same as my rats do, looking for food. She's still too cautious to take anything from my fingers, but she'll take it as soon as I drop it, and she's not scared of me, and sits right under my hand until I drop the food! I'm really hoping that with time, she'll settle down more & more. I haven't tried picking her up yet, as I'm not anxious to get bitten. I think the trick here might be to never let them bite you in the first place. Biting sets a standard- they learn that if they bite, you stop handling them.

That said-
How cute! Are they born with that bit of fuzz?? If so, that's awesome. They're adorable! Keep us updated on how fast they grow, please?

And for those of use who don't have scales, and don't have comparisons... How is their size in comparison to mouse pinkies?

No fur at birth, they're bright pink just like mouse pinks. Size wise, perhaps slightly larger than a newborn mouse pink at birth.

Once mine started biting I started using leather gloves and let them bite away and kept my hand in the tank so they wouldn't get conditioned to biting = hand goes away. Only problem is I need tougher leather gloves cause they've worked their way through the finger tips on the old gloves.

I've been handling the pups almost daily now, trying to get them better socialized than their parents. They're much more active and crawly at their size than mouse pinks and fuzzies. Eyes are still closed at 10-11 days now but they really cruise around anyway. 6-7 grams or about fuzzy size now. Their growth so far pretty much parallels mouse pink growth rates.

If the daily handling doesn't work well enough I'm thinking of perhaps fostering a few from a future litter with a mouse or rat mother and see how they do if raised by nice tame domestic rats or mice.

Ah, fostering is a great idea! I was wondering about size because I have a little Ruthven's king that's a very picky feeder (hasn't eaten in like 12 weeks), and I want to try a natal as soon as I have a litter. See if she'll take those. If newborns are anywhere within he size of a couple day old mouse pinks, they'll work.

Good luck with the pups! I hope it works!

Earliest pics I've got so far of newborn to 1 day old natal rat pinks.

They're pretty small at birth, though maybe not quite as small as a mouse newborn.