Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I had 1.3 young adults. The male up and died, don't know why. Anyway, today I got some adults that were housed together, 1.5. I want to put them with the 3 females I already have. I'll be putting them in a large container. I wouldn't do this with mice. But can I do it with rats without them killing eachother? From what I understand mixing and matching can be done with rats. One of the three females has a little of babies a few days old.
Thanks for any input,
Mike

Mixing and matching can be done with most rats but don't put the male in with females who currently have pups. That would be almost uncertain disaster.

I have had females who would fight with strange or new females although most of them don't. If you find you have a female who is picky about her cage mate don't move her to a new group unless you have to and monitor her closely. To add females to her group let her raise some of the pups as she shouldn't have a problem with them.
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Marcia - FroggieB Dragons
www.froggieb.com/MHDHome.html

>>I had 1.3 young adults. The male up and died, don't know why. Anyway, today I got some adults that were housed together, 1.5. I want to put them with the 3 females I already have. I'll be putting them in a large container. I wouldn't do this with mice. But can I do it with rats without them killing eachother? From what I understand mixing and matching can be done with rats. One of the three females has a little of babies a few days old.
>>Thanks for any input,
>>Mike

Don't try to add anyone to a group with new babies. I would wait til they are weaned. With rats you may get individuals that are more aggressive or less social. But it is individuals not a species thing. Are the adults already breeding? If they aren't you may find they are too old or not as fast to settle into it as the younger group. I find that with rats groups of 1.3 or 1.4 seem better than larger groups. So you may rather get another boy or flip flop him into the other group. I usually move my male rats group to group. I can better control when I will have litters and fathered by whom. (I raise dumbos and hairless and sell 'extras' as pets) 95% of the time it isn't a problem. But if you want continuous supply you can just put another male in with the 3.
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Sonya

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