Considerations before starting to breed

Before you start breeding your own feeder mice, there are some things that you need to think about first, preferably before buying the animals and the cage ect.

The most common feeder mice are fancy mice, natal rats and African Pygmy Mice. They differ in size, breeding cycle, litter size and requirements. Make sure the species you pick fits your own requirements and those of your pets in all respects.

Many breeders misjudge the number of offspring the mice will have. Find out how many litters the species you want will have per month and how big the average litter is. What are you going to do with animals that you don't need at the moment? Rescue organisations and shelters usually won't adopt feeder mice.

It makes a difference whether you need pinkies/juveniles or adult mice. Babies grow fast and may be to big to feed to your snake after a few days, while adults can just stay with their group and can be fed to the snake at any time. Take this into consideration as well when you think about how many feeder mice per month you will need.

How much room do you have for the cages and how big can they be? What do you want to use for furniture? How much time and work are you willing to invest into the feeder mice? How much money are you willing to spend, for food ect.?
Answer this questions for yourself while planning and compare your answers to the need to the species you want to keep. If you can, find other people who have experience with the species and ask them about it.

Unneutered male fancy mice have an intensive smell. If you cannot tolerate that smell, it's better to choose another species instead of keeping the feeder mice outside. The other species mentioned smell very little or not at all.

Breeding feeder mice will cost you a certain amount of money, make sure you are willing to spend it.

The animals should spend only a part of their life breeding and you need to find a solution for them once they are retired. Old females make good aunts for young mothers and will help with raising the babies, they can stay with their group. Consider their retirement as a payment for the work they did for you.
If you don't want to keep the old mice, you need to find another solution. Feeding them to your herp is one, but if you don't want or cannot do that, you need to find another home for them. Shelters and rescue organisations often won't help you with this.

If you come to the conclusion that breeding your own feeders isn't worth all the effort for your one corn snake, there's always the chance to find other snake owners ect. who will take the surplus mice from you. Check herp message boards to find such people in your area.

Keep in mind that the size of the group will at times grow considerably when all the females have their babies. Don't plan the cage size just for

Translation
Jedediah