mice breeding but not getting pregnant

WyvernWyrm

i have had my mice for roughly a month now and they r breeding like crazy ive witnessed it but nobodys getting pregnant! how can this be? and how can i change it?

VARNYARD · Posted: Sat Oct 14, 2006 1:09 pm Post subject:

This would depend on your lighting and temps. Mice need 8-12 hours of lighting and the temps do not need to rise above 80*F.

alex · Valued Member Joined: Aug 03, 2005 Posts: 106

Generally at room temp and out of draughts mice do fine. They're called house mice for a reason.

What kind of diet are you feeding - a nutritional imbalance/lack would certainly cause early embryonic death. How're you housing them? Are you providing discreet nest sites? Are you actually seeing intormission or is it attempted breeding?

Are you observing anything like gestation? If you're observing gestation (i.e. obviously pregnant mice) and then no babies, someone is killing and eating them (I've had males as well as females do this)

As well, beware mice with yellow coat tones. The "yellow" gene in mice is lethal in the homozygous form, mice whose coat tone is yellow (don't really know how to describe this, look at an undergrad genetics text froma library and they should have photos) are heterozygous for this trait. I doubt this is currently your problem, but you will lose 1/4 of each litter to a genetic defect linked to yellow coat colour

Kilioa · Posted: Sun Oct 15, 2006 1:01 am Post subject:

deffinetly check if their getting eaten . . . deffinetly a feast for a mouse already used to eating its own . . . . i had a black mouse that ate the newborn pinks and even ate the brains of one of the other females
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1.0.0 Blue Tegu (Jaeger)
0.1.0 Colombian Black & White Tegu (Kilioa)
1.0.0 Red Tegu (Odin)
2.3.0 Black Emperor Scorpions
1.0.0 Ball Python (Lucifer)
1.1.0 Fat Tail Geckos
0.1.0 White Lined Gecko

snakehandler · Member Joined: Jan 03, 2008 Posts: 38

give them extra dog food. Pellets. mice sometimes have a lack of calcium and amino, thats why they eat their young sometimes.