Reptile & Amphibian Forums

recently, i decided to start breeding my own mice. the guy i usually buy from has really cheap prices, but lately he's been really unreliable. i've also been spending a fortune every week at the local pet store. to top it all off, i lost my job last thursday, so needless to say, i've been trying to save money. well, the problem i have now is i think the mice have fleas. i'm not planning on feeding these mice to my snakes, but is it a good idea not to feed the pinkies as well? how can i get rid of the fleas? someone told me a while back that as far as snakes go, you should worry about mites and ticks, but usually not fleas. i think i should also mention i have a cat in the house. another question i have is how do you keep the mice from eating their babies? one of my females had 9 babies last weekend and almost every one of them had their arms eaten off! as far as i know, i'm giving the mice the right food, i.e. dry dog food and bird seed. am i doing anything wrong? should i change something? sorry this is such a long post, but i appreciate any help/ideas!

thanks!
greg

First I would recommend posting this problem on the feeder food forum. You might get more responses.

Why do you think the mice have fleas? Have you seen bugs? I gotta say I have never had my rodents get fleas. Lice yes....never fleas. But it does happen. There were several threads in the last month on this on the feeder forum.

Mice cannabalise their first litters somewhat often. Stress is a big thing for mice. Don't peek in on them or they stress and freak. Second time around they tend to do much better. I check mine for feeding and changing. Again, you will likely find loads more on the feeder food forum.
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Sonya

Failure is not an option. It comes bundled with the software.