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I am planning to keep my rodent rack in my reptile room, the ambient temps are usually 79*f-82*f. Is this too warm for them to reach optimal levels of production? if so, will I see a substantial decrease?

At what temps does production start to suffer? (mainly concerned with heat)

Also, some people tell me that rats and mice should be housed in seperate rooms for various reasons... is this a concern? or will they do just fine in the same room?

Thank you for all the help everyone.
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-Ross Payan - www.LeosAnonymous.com

Leos Anonymous

Ball Pythons, Red Striped Leos, W.Hognose and Screaming AFT's

my personal experiences with temps are somewhat limited. I live in the seattle area, and we rarely have extreme temps in either direction..

ive found mice produce the best in cooler temps.. betwen the 50-60's are IDEAL!..

in my personal experiences.. anything into the mid to high 80's and production seems to drop off for me.. litters get canaballized.. babies die randomly at weird ages for no good reason..

i think temps your animals can take are dependant on your colony, and whats "normal" there.. normal for me is in the 60's... so anything HOT from that kills them off pretty quick

but.. if your temps are usually into the 70's and 80's and they do alright.. im sure they could handle higher temps than mine ever would...

as far as being housed in diffrent rooms.. there is no need IMHO...

i house my mice and rats in the same shed, ive never had any problems... except if i find mites or something... then ive got that many more animals to clean! LOL other than that... they can be housed in the same room with no problems at all..

best of luck

dan

>>I am planning to keep my rodent rack in my reptile room, the ambient temps are usually 79*f-82*f. Is this too warm for them to reach optimal levels of production? if so, will I see a substantial decrease?
>>
>>At what temps does production start to suffer? (mainly concerned with heat)
>>
>>Also, some people tell me that rats and mice should be housed in seperate rooms for various reasons... is this a concern? or will they do just fine in the same room?
>>
>>Thank you for all the help everyone.
>>-----
>>-Ross Payan - www.LeosAnonymous.com
>>
>> Leos Anonymous
>>
>>Ball Pythons, Red Striped Leos, W.Hognose and Screaming AFT's
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Sonya

My rats live in a shed in the Los Angeles area with just a fan. There was a slight fall off in production this summer. I can't really be sure if it was heat induced (it got up into the 90's regularly) or age (nine months of back to back breeding). I keep my rats and snakes in the same shed, but since I don't have mice I really don't know about that issue.

DeMak

Thanks for the help everyone, I really appreciate you guys taking the time to help me out.

I guess I'll just have them set up in the Reptile Room and see how it works.

Thanks again for the help.
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-Ross Payan - www.LeosAnonymous.com

Leos Anonymous

Ball Pythons, Red Striped Leos, W.Hognose and Screaming AFT's

I've heard that a lot of rats carry myco and that they can give it to your mice and that's why they say you shouldn't keep them in the same room. I got my first group of mice from people who kept their rats and mice together and my mice got myco. What seemed to bring on the symptoms was being stressed and being in temps of 65 degrees or lower seemed to make more of them sick than when they were in 75 degrees or more... so maybe 65 degrees or less is stressful. Who knows. As far as heat... mine seem to do better in dry heat than in humid heat. Anyway... you just have to gather up all opinions and punt.

Good luck.
MissHisssss

Well, I'm keeping my mice outside on the patio, during the summer (central FL) the high is around 90, at night it's still 78, and they did fine. They usually give about 18 pinks per litter every 3 weeks, so it doesn't seem like the high temps impacted them that much, production-wise.
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-audri
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