My breeding experiences have been a mix of good and crazy. My first 2 litters were accidental. I went from 2 to 16 rats in 2 days. The litters were cute though. I'd bough the moms from a local pet store who didn't seperate males from females. They were my first rats and I was inexperienced. despite plenty of research. I thought the females would be okay because I bought them when they were 'too young' to reproduce. HA!

I ended up giving the pet store back all but one of the babies, who I named Bungee. She died just under a year of age. Her genetics were not the greatest, as the rats at that pet store  were badly inbred. Her mom died during surgury when a huge tumor was being removed. Their room mate died of old age and possible heart problems several months later. Both girls were almost 2 years old.

The other litter I had went better. I had 10 babies between the breeding of Slick and Troi. I studied the breeding rats carefully, making sure I was breeding well for personality and health. They were pet shop ratties, but I inspected their temperment closely and their health. I was glad when most of the babies were born healthy and I managed to keep one boy. I named him Nosecone. The unfortunate thing that happened with this litter was that one boy escaped  into the wall of my apartment. He started running along the baseboard heaters in the other apartments and the Landlord had a fit, though she didn't find out about me. While that was going on, the babies were housed at my parents' place. The babies eventually went to a pet store that only sold their rats as pets. I've since bought many rats from that store and have been pleased with their stock. Once in a while you'll get a sick feller, like my Digital, but otherwise their rats have been pretty good. :-)

I say go into breeding rats with plenty of research under your belt. Also realize that things don't always go well. I breed cockatiels and I've lost a few clutches due to inexperience and illness. Work with an experienced breeder if you can and if you can't, talk to those who have been doing it for a looong time. It's more than putting a male and female rat together 

about fifteen years ago, rats were not sold as pets in most pet stores.  the only way you could get a rat was by getting a 3 week old from the feeder bins.  (by getting the rat at 3 weeks you could be sure that it wasn't pregnant).  this was the source of most of my rats.  for whatever reason, my parents (i was fairly young) thought it would be ok to breed my male and my brother's female.  we had done some (obviously incomplete) research and thought that by lining up homes for about 10 rats that it would be fine.  fortunately, the rat had the babies with no complications, but there were 16 of them.  needless to say, rats were still enough of a cute weird pet that we managed to find homes for them all, but we have all decided that it was a really bad idea in retrospect.  i would never breed one of my rats ever again.  i had a positive experience, and all the babies were healthy, but i would still never repeat it.  there are too many rats in this world that need loving homes.  so i'll leave the breeding to people who do it full time and know what they're doing.

As a UK breeder, there seems to bea lot less open pet shop rat breeding, because it is so frowned upon. There are always people, who are misinformed, or just  well... who will breed from rats from pet shops, but in general the majority of breeder in the UK who aren't breeding for pet shop 'stock', are breeding from Pedigree rats.

I've had 8 litters, and have two more matings planned tomorrow actually 

I keep a waiting list for the babies I breed, I only breed from rats with known backgrounds, and who are the healthiest, and friendliest. My rats are pets first and foremost, and I rehome all my babies to prevetted homes, with contracts, stating various things. (more info on www.hkmrats.co.uk if anyone wants to know )

However, my sixth litter, went pear shaped. The mating was planned out very carefully, and we decided to mate my doe, Orion's Haven Liatris, to my mentors buck Shunamite Taras. They were a perfect match, they were mated, and Liatris took.

Day 21 came, and went. Day 22.. Day 23... Day 24... at this point, she started to bleed. And so, I waited.. 4 hours later she'd given birth to what was 9 babies. 7 were still born, and 2 alive. The two live ones were very bruised looking. After 2 hours, they'd not fed, so I fostered them onto my other doe who had a litter a couple of days old. But, they had no chance. I stayed up with them for hours, and kept an eye on things, I took out some of the foster mum, Auriga's, own babies, and kept the warm and fed them myself, in the hope it would give Liatris' two a better chance. But within 6 hours, both babies were dead 

Liatris went through a long series of blood tests, to try and find out if something had gone wrong because of a virus, but everything tested clear. To this day, I don't know why they didn't survive, perhaps a baby had gotten stuck in the passageway, and caused several to die, and the two who were alive, to be too battered and bruised to survive. But, it was a heartbreaker.

I'd urge anyone wishing to breed, to get a mentor. And to breed from rats with known backgrounds (Pedigrees). It isn't easy, it isn't cheap. I spent a lot of money on bloodtests, a lot of people might not have done. But I needed to know that she, and my other rats, were safe. Breeding isn't something that should be taken lightly, in any cases.

I would like to share my story as well...I am still fairly new to the rat world so when I got my first 2 rats (a brother and sister) they were 5 weeks old. The person I got them from told me that they didn't need to be separated until they were 5 mos wrong, I believed her because she was a "breeder" so I figured I had time to decide whether or not I was going to get them each a friend of their respected genders or get the male neutered. So I went about my days researching vets that neutered and seeing how much that was etc. Now mind you they were born December 2nd so I figured I had til about the beginning of May to decide. Well it took my girl (Expresso--shes all black with a white tummy and feet as is her brother puck and the father of her babies) a little over 3 mos from the time I got her but she got pregnant...I however did not know that because she didn't get any "fatter" than her brother so I was shocked one morning when I woke up and went to the bathroom and as I was getting ready to take a shower I glanced over and noticed my male (puck) cowering on one side of the cage in a corner while on the other side of the cage all the bedding was pushed up against it and falling out...I was thinking no it can't be and then I heard the chirping I was like oh no. So I went to investigate and sure enough there were some pinkies suckling on momma. So I tentatively put my hand in the cage and she came right up and licked me (shes a sweet heart) so I counted the babies...8 total born but one was dead. So I set up an aquarium I had and put her and her babies in (she had 5 boys and 2 girls). She was a good mom and immediately built a nest everytime I cleaned the cage. She would let me hold the babies. Eventually the babies grew fast. She had 4 black babies with white bellies and feet 2 boys and 2 girls whom I named Rocky and Bullwinkle for the boys and Connie and Carla for the girls. She also had a black self who I named Houdini because he can escape any place I put him to run around in while Im cleaning the cage. She also had a PEW and a Tan whom I found homes for they are boys and I tentatively named them Peanut butter and Fluff. So anyways...today they are 5 weeks and I separated them from their mom. I will probably end up keeping all the other ones except the 2 I found a home for because the lady that was interested in the wanted them all which could only mean that she wanted them as feeders, so they will be mine unless I can find a suitable home for them. In terms of health though everything is so far so good, I read online and did everything they said to do to take care of a litter. They are all healthy happy little babies that LOVE to ride on my shoulders and sleep in my hair lol. But I will never Breed or accidentally breed again. In due time I will eventually have all my boys fixed starting with their dad who doesn't get along with the new buddy I got him when I had to take the mom out or his own sons he just beats them all up so I after he heals from his neuter I will put him back with his sister because he still gets along with her. So I guess this story isn't as sad as a lot of the ones I have read but I just wanted to share my story with all of you. Eventually I do want to become a breeder but right now I just have all 10 of my babies (5 boys and 5 girls) as loving pets.

That's kind of the point of this thread, to show all the things that can go wrong with a litter, even when they are carefully planned or accommodated. It helps people decide whether they really want to breed. Ollie, if I were you, I would contact a responsible breeder and ask to be mentored.

I've had a variety of experiences with breeding, particularly in recent times.
My first ever litter was a careful planned and researched affair and I was pleased that all babies found proper forever homes and we didn't even have to consider the pet store (big arguements between my mother and I over that one, over time she has come to see things the way I do: Pet stores + baby rats = NO).
That one was a good experience, everything went well, the babies had gorgeous temperaments and were healthy and robust.
My more recent experiences, however, have not been so rosy. Of the three litters I have dealt with in the last year (well more like between september and january), two were straight out rescues, and the other one came as a result of a woman breeding one of my males to her female without asking me while he was boarding with her. I'm not sure which of the circumstances makes me angrier, though i think it is the last, in that she knew what she was doing, and she never even asked - she just assumed I wouldn't mind. At least in the case of the rescues it was a result of ignorance.
The first two litters were 3 days and two weeks old when I got them. I rescued the mother of the 3 day old babies from a store that was breeding their females back to back despite health issues in the line not to mention the stress for the poor mothers. I'd managed to get them to remove the male, but the damage was still done. I took her home, but went back two days later after a friend informed me that the mother that had been sharing her ridiculously small tank was too old and unwell to nurse her two week olds babies - the mother I'd taken was fostering them. So they came home with me too. I had trouble finding homes for them, but in the end, I managed it. But along the way, I lost two of them. One died when he was only 10 days old. When he was about 8 days old, his mother stopped nursing him. I tried to nurse him myself, to no avail. He died in my hand two days later. The other was Spot, a girl from the older litter. There was epilepsy in her line. Her brother had two fits that we know of, she also had two, unfortunately the second one was too much for her body. She also had other things going on in her poor wee body. At the age of two months, we said goodbye to her. Her brother (the only male) was neutered and remains with me, as did the mother I was able to take home. The #$^$&^*@#s at the store would not let me take Bud's mother home, despite being able to offer her a better quality of life. The poor thing was confined to a small tank, after being bred back to back for god knows how long, and she had a tumour as well. Not that the SPCA did anything.
It was a heart breaking time in my life.
The third litter, which my boy fathered, should never have happened. If the woman had asked me if she could breed him, I would've said no. He was too young for us to be certain of his health and temperament and suitability to be bred. By the time I found out, it was too late. He fathered 16 babies. Some are doing better than others. Some have had respiratory problems, as did their father a couple of months after they were born. Some have had minor aggression problems. Their father turned out to be the kind of male that ends up having major issues due to his hormones, and became rather aggressive to rats and people. His brother also had the same problem and was neutered. His father had stress issues that I am aware of (and yet the person who has him is breeding him despite all this ). Had she left well alone, that boy never would have been bred. There's no way I would have allowed it. There wouldn't be 16 young rats with potential/existing health or temperament problems. I have one of his daughters... never before have I encountered rats that are so incredibly difficult to bond with! Even a biter that I recently adopted has bonded with me in less than a week! After 7 months I am still no closer to her than when I first brought her home permanently. Her father passed away after I had him neutered. He woke from the anaesthetic, then went back to sleep to never wake again.
I worry every day about those rats that I found homes for. I worry that someone will ignore my request that they DO NOT breed from them and that they will further weaken the already damaged lines we have here in New Zealand, that they will put them through hell and bring suffering upon them.
So far, three of the homes I found for various rats since october have ended up not working out. One of them rehomed her rats with my consent, but failed to advise me properly of health concerns for the rat she had adopted from me as company for her existing girls - something that we may have been able to resolve before it got as bad as it did. Another rehomed hers after promising to me that of all her rats, she would never rehome the youngest girls, including the one she had adopted from me. I only found out that she had rehomed her by accident when she slipped up in conversation. it took a lot of work to get out of her that she had rehomed her and where she had gone. The third home has suddenly, 5 months after adoption, said that she no longer has time for the rats, nor can afford them.
I despair of breeding sometimes. It is just so damn hard to find a decent home for the babies, one that will treat them right, care for them properly and keep them, instead of giving up on them when the 'novelty' wears off. Yet at the same time, if those of us here in NZ who know how to breed properly don't continue the healthy lines, eventually our healthy lines will be so tainted that one day we may no longer have pet rats here in NZ.
 

My post relates to temperament, health and breeding, and why it is so important to not breed a rat with poor health or bad temperament... ever.

There are two cases that I have dealt with.
First there was Beau. I had gotten him because of his exceptional markings as a hope to continue to develop the line in NZ as we have such limited varieties and his was unique. He was around 3 months old when I got him and initially he was boarding with a friend of mine. She knew that I was hoping to be able to breed him, and while I was away on holiday... it happened. I got home to find an email along the lines of 'I hope you don't mind, but I put him in with one of my girls the other night!'. Well by then it was too late. Most disappointing was that I had pointed out that I did not want to breed him before he was a year old. Had it been up to me, he never would have been bred.
His litter turned 1 year old this christmas.
Once he came home from boarding, he always seemed very neurotic, no matter how much time I put in to him. Then Beau developped temperament problems in about march this year. Knowing that one of his brothers had also become badly tempered and was a problem for people and rats, and neutering had been successful, I made the decision to neuter him when he failed to improve in temperament. Unfortunately although the surgery went well, he woke up from the anaesthetic and then went back to sleep again... and never woke up.
His offspring, of which there were 16, all found homes with a lot of effort on my part. I have one of his daughters and she is one of the most neurotic rats I have ever encountered (with the exception of Gecko, who will be mentioned later). She has also developped a tendency to bite first and ask questions later. Several of her siblings were also bitey when young and can still be temperamental.
Beau's either father or brother (we're not sure what to believe from the pet store), Apache, was adopted by someone else in the country. He sired two litters, which personally I didn't really approve of given what we know of the family. And this is why.
Apache showed a tendency towards a nervous disposition. His offspring have also developped this. One of the boys, though less than a year old, looks very elderly and has always been very shy, nervous and uncertain. Apache had also barbered himself in the past. He has since developped a urinary infection. There have been other health problems within the line.
The temperament of rats cannot be outbred, and health issues only get passed on to future generations.

The second case involves a group of interbred rats from a pet store. The thread I posted about Screech (Vicious Rat - help desperately needed) partially documents this family. Screech seemed like a nice little boy. Unfortunately he is genetically aggressive. While he seems fine most of the time, for some reason he is prone to bouts of aggression. Dangerous levels of aggression.
His daughter, only a few months younger than he is, due to repeated breedings, is following in his footsteps and has begun displaying the same type of behaviour. We're not sure anymore that it's genetically hormonal behaviour, as Tardak (chemical castration) combined with Screech being neutered (the behaviour started 4 months post neuter) have failed to improve the situation. I am starting to wonder if it is in fact neurological or so severe that neutering and Tardak simply aren't enough to combat it.
Both Screech and Shadow have a nervous disposition. Gecko, Shadow's sister, and Kahli, a daughter from an earlier litter, also both have nervous tendencies. Well Gecko's is hardly a tendency... it's just who she is. She is simply neurotic and cannot be allowed to free range in some areas because she is impossible to recapture. She runs from her own shadow. Kahli is also a very grabby rat and I have fears she may become worse.
Due to a pet store's indiscriminate breeding, I now have a damaged finger and two severe bite wounds still healing. But worst of all, several rats are unable to lead a proper life because of the damage resulting from poor genetics that were allowed to be continued. They may be able to live reasonably happy lives, but never what they could be.
http://www.geocities.com/project_rat/finger
http://www.geocities.com/project_rat/Casestudy
The above links are to my website. The first one shows the damage to my finger and the second one includes a further indepth case study of the above.

In addition to this, there is my "Drury family".
These rats came to me from a south auckland pet store who had been back-to-back breeding their females and inbreeding them to all hell. Thankfully when I gave them hell about it, they removed the males from the females' tanks, but by the time I discovered it was happening, the damage was done.
I adopted a female and her babies as well as the other litter that had been in her cage. The mother of the second litter was no longer able to nurse her babies and the mother I rescued was fostering them. Her name is Mum.
Mum's litter (her second since she was sexually mature) consisted of four babies. At the age of 10 days, despite my efforts to nurse him myself for two days, including sub-q liquids, one of the little boys died. The other three were fine, but never developped to the sizes that one would expect a rat to grow to. They were all stunted, particularly their poor mother.
In the other litter, which was two weeks older, there were 8 babies. Half of them flourished and did quite well, the other half were always smaller. They were all rehomed (with the exception of two that stayed with me) before I discovered that their line carried epilepsy.
ALL of these rats have a highly nervous disposition. Both Mum and the boy from the older litter, Bud, have suffered resp infections and Mum has aged very prematurely and I struggle to keep weight on her. While both have come a long way, particularly Mum, it is still noticeable that they are nervous rats - particularly Bud. Spot, my little Spottiebot, never flourised no matter what I tried. She sustained a small bite wound behind her ear and scratched it in to a huge sore overnight. All efforts to heal it and prevent her from making it worse failed for nearly a month. She lost weight and I couldn't get it back on her. She became more comfortable around me and was happy to play. She suffered two epileptic fits in front of me, and one evening I found her dead in her cage at the age of only about two-three months.  She had suffered a seizure greater than what her body could cope with. Bud has also suffered at least one epileptic fit. Some idiot wanted to buy him off me to try and breed 'pink eyed minks'. I told him where to go and chose to keep Buddy boy and have him neutered. He's never been a big boy, but has finally started to put on more weight and lives happily with a group of other rats who he adores.
Related to these rats, I know of two rats who developped cataracts at the age of only 9 months. Bud and Spot's mother had a tumour when she birthed them. The... nasty people... at the pet store refused to let me take her as well. She was their 'special rat'. Fools.
A friend also has a relative of Mum and Bud. I think from the timing of it all that he is one of Mum's sons from her first litter. He was rescued from a woman who no longer wanted him because he wouldn't bond with her. He is still far more nervous than Mum or Bud, but has also come along way.
They are all worried little ratties and it breaks my heart to know that it needn't have ever happened.

Please please please do not breed unhealthy, young, or ill tempered rats and please don't bred back-to-back!
I am going to the SPCA tomorrow to find out how we can put a stop to pet stores breeding rats and mice themselves and to make sure that rats at least are sexed properly in stores. New Zealand is reaching a crisis point with our rats. Life expectancy and health and temperament are all deteriorating because of bad breeding. We cannot import any more blood lines, and at this rate, soon we may no longer have rats at all. 

Being very new to the wonderful world of rat ownership, I have no plans to breed them, if ever at all.

Back in late September/early October '06, I was starting to feel my maternal drive kicking in, and desperately needed something to take care of. A classmate of mine was hiding two female rats in her dorm room. On a geology field trip one day, she told me how great rats were as pets, how they would run up and down her arms when she opened their cage. My heart melted, and there was my first mistake. A week later I set out with my now (very, VERY understanding) boyfriend to search the city high and low for a pet store that sold rats.

After a full day of searching, I finally found a store that sold rats. I was under the impression that these rats were being sold as pets; hairless were kept in one tank, small and large both separated and all marketed under the title of "fancy." What should have tipped me off was how crowded these tanks were. Small 20 gallon tanks filled with at least 10-15 rats of various ages. But I was all gooey-eyed, and picked up two females. If the small living quarters didn't tip me off, the fact that one of my females, Darwin, was brought out from "the back" as a special sale because she was dumbo-eared.

My other girl, FitzRoy, was very skittish. My boyfriend noted that her nipples were very swollen, and we panicked because we thought that might mean she was pregnant. We watched her carefully for two weeks, but no change in her behavior or abdomen. (I now think that when I bought her, she recently had a litter taken away from her; I went back to the pet store not long after I bought Darwin and FitzRoy to find a dozen small rats in the cage I had gotten FitzRoy from, with nearly identical markings, and all looking like they were much too young to be weaned.)

Darwin, on the other hand, was getting plump. I admit I was giving these girls way too many treats, so I cut those out almost completely when I noticed Darwin's quick weight-gain. I moved the rats from my dorm room to my Aaron's apartment (that we now share). I told him to make sure not to spoil them while I wasn't there, because I feared for Darwin's health. To make this long-winded story short, about three weeks after I took the girls home, I happened upon an article about pregnant rat behavior. After I processed the info, I ran to the nearest phone to call Aaron. Before I told him what I had found, he said, "Darwin's building a nest." D'oh.

Darwin had approximately 16 babies, at least 4 of which "disappeared." I suppose Darwin ate them, there being not a single trace anywhere. Being inexperienced, I had no place to keep FitzRoy except in that same cage. Darwin didn't mind, and FitzRoy kept her distance. When the babies grew up, FitzRoy gave them a lot of attention and let them sleep with her when Darwin was overcrowded. I was lucky on that part. I admit that having the babies was fun. They were cute, they didn't fuss much when they were picked up, but they were getting EXPENSIVE. Their age inversely correlated with the money in my wallet. I called unnamed pet store and told them the situation. They said something along the lines of, "Congratulations, you have free pets!" Haha. I said I couldn't keep them, and no one I knew would take them. Okay, bring them in at 7 weeks and we'll take them.

So, at 6 weeks (after I had the boys separated from the girls-- by that time a friend had given me a 30-gallon tank to house the boys) I called the pet store. I mentioned the accidental birth-- to which I received verbatim the same "Congratulations, you have free pets!" I stopped. Obviously this wasn't something the pet store was unfamiliar with. I said I have 10 dumbo-eared rats I'm bringing back, as per the earlier phone agreement. The woman on the other end asked if I couldn't keep them, because they were full of rats at the moment. My heart was breaking, because I knew what that meant. I finally was able to convince them to let me take the babies I had raised, cared for, played with, for no compensation whatsoever.

Giving the babies back was a traumatic experience. I watched the store attendant take the box of boys and the box of girls, and dump them both in the same tank that I had bought FitzRoy from. I cried right there in front of the tank, because of everything that implied. These babies I had raised were just profit for them, and they had no concern for their health or wellbeing whatsoever.

I know anyone who is thinking of breeding wouldn't wind up in the situation I was in, which I was wholly unprepared for. Raising kittens is very expensive, and very time-consuming. My cages had to be cleaned at least once per day, which ran up extra costs for bedding. I went through many 5-lb bags of rat food over the course of those 7 weeks. Not to mention the overpowering smell after coming home from a day of classes. I didn't mention my boyfriend had a roommate when he was so nice as to take the rats to his apartment.. his roommate left after that experience, and for other reasons as well, but he asked repeatedly that my boyfriend get rid of the rats. I'm still heartbroken over this whole experience, to think of the 10 boys and girls that may or may not have found good homes. I fear for Darwin, FitzRoy, and the two boys I kept from Darwin's litter, Gollum and (Big) Ben, because of all the health complications I'm sure unmonitored breeding will result in.

A while back my boyfriend and I decided we wanted baby ratlets. So we put my baby girl Francesca with our manrat Sir Lix-A-Lot.
A month later, I checked in on my sweet girl, and I witnessed what I thought was the miracle of birth.

Was I ever wrong.

As soon as she started popping them out, she started... you know. "Disposing" of them, for lack of wanting to describe it in any other way...

Well, she did that for a little while, and then she just stopped. Entirely. There were still little babies in her. She slowly started to deteriorate. Barely eating, barely moving.. I'd pick her up and she would just cuddle with me. I really thought she was going to be a goner.
We took her to the vet [the next day, she started giving birth at some god awful time in the morning], they gave her some Baytril. She slowly started popping out more babies. She was not expected to live.

Needless to say, there were no live babies. The only positive thing that had occurred through this whole ordeal is that Francesca survived. She is stull with us today, as crazy as ever. But never again will I ever attempt such a foolish thing.