How would I go about breeding mice under these conditions...

[Cirith Ungol]

New corn eggs are in the incubator, prices of pinkies have skyrocketed and I'm as tight-fisted as ever...

The plan:
To breed mice, not at home, but at the summer house in the woods. The problem I see is that there are venomous snakes in the woods, a kind of viper we have here, so I'm a bit worried I might end up with a lot of vipers arround the house. That wouldn't be all that preferable, but how risky/likely is this really?

I thought that maybe the mice would be allowed to breed in a (or several) cages in one of the outhouses - however, none of the outhouses are air tight, there are lots of spaces and places where thin animals like snakes can go in or out.

And if that problem was solved somehow, I'd still not know how to do the actual breeding. How would I go about that? What would I have to keep in mind?

 

[Mushroom Spore]

I was about to say that vipers shouldn't be an issue...and then I read the third paragraph. Snakes are crazy and will wedge into spaces in defiance of all laws of physics, so yeah, you'd end up with a pretty big problem. Even if they couldn't get into the cages, they might still be loitering in dark crevices and under stuff in the outhouse and then you go in there and

Why would you be breeding at a summer house, and how much time will you be spending there? They'll need pretty frequent care and maintenance, so it seems to me like you could solve all your problems by just breeding at home. (Plus if these "outhouses" aren't climate-controlled, the temps could be a serious problem for the mice too.)

 

[Cirith Ungol]

You grasped the problem of the viper-sniper in the dark

No, not climate controlled but during the time I'd be breeding I'd expect the temperatures to be everything between 10'C and 27'C if it gets extremely hot on a sunny day. Would insulation work, like for example breeding them in a cage full of long spirally wood chips, paper strips and grass or hay?

I'm sure I could leave the mice alone for 2-3 days (no?) if I'm gone for a while, but other than that I'd be there much of the time.

Why not at home? Because I have a tiny flat, it's full (really ) and I'm sure my snakes would go bonkers smelling them all the time. Secondly, because I'd probably be more at the summer house than at home.

What care do mice need then?


Edit: Beautiful snake. We have the black form up here (because of the cold). If I knew they could be kept in tanks (which they can't as they stop eating, I've heard) I might have given it a try .
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vipera_berus

 

[mindlessvw]

I think snakes wouldn't be a problem if you had locking lids on the mice cages. You may have a few unwanted guests but otherwise not that big of a deal imo...on the caring for mice i would say the issue is if they get a wee bit hungry they are eating their babies...or the males will eat them anyways...kind of gross...the only issue i have had with breeding mice is they produce at such a fast level and don't seem to stay the sizes you need long enough...you end up killing them and freezing them...otherwise ya it is cheaper!

 

[DrAce]

As far as breeding them, there shouldn't be much problem, certainly as far as our lab-mice are concerned.

Heck, it takes an evening with a male and female together for us to be sure (like 80% sure) that there's a pregnancy present.

You can actually check. Within about 8-10 hours of mating, there is often a visible 'plug' in the female's vaginal tract. This plug disappears about 12-14h after mating.

Males are usually fertile at about 8 weeks of age (although earlier is not uncommon). We keep a colony of males in separate cages (they don't like each other too much) and then place two girls with each male for an evening. A pregnant female (if you want pups) can be housed with one other pregnant female. The one which wasn't plugged wasn't in the right part of her cycle, and can be used again in a couple of weeks (if she's not showing signs of pregnancy... sometimes the plug is hard to see).

You can get about 10-17 pups from a single mating (sometimes less). I've had one with 28 viable foetuses in her... that was pretty grotesque. Curiously, runted pups tend to reach maturity earlier than non-runts. So you should get them out earlier.

It's pretty easy. It is also true in lab mice... I don't know if your types will be the same or not. These are F1-hybrid strains (white, red eyed, lab mice).