i have had 3 "female" mice for about a year. Today i found that they had had 9 babies!!! I know that one is definitely a mother. I don't know whether the other mouse is a mother too, or the other two mice are males. Plus, why haven't they ever had babies before?
Can mice change their genders to reproduce?
And how can I look after the baby mice? The adults seem to have that covered, but should i do anything extra?
2006-12-06 19:50:31 · 13 answers · asked by Anonymous in Pets ➔ Other - Pets
I don't know what genders the mice are...
I have no idea which one is the father or anything...
2006-12-06 20:02:02 · update #1
I would definitely take them to the vet, find out for sure who's male and who isn't, and start separating the males from females... otherwise they will continue to reproduce and reproduce until your cage is packed (and it really won't be nice if they started inbreeding!!!!)
Pet store people don't always know the gender (among many other things would be good if they knew).
If you wanted 3 females to begin with I assume you didn't plan on having them reproducing? So wait until the babies are big enough, then give the ones away / sell the ones you don't want to keep, and really, separate all males from females! (2 cages)
Be careful the ones you give away don't end up in some snake's stomach!
Nope they will NOT change gender (???!!!)
The mom-mouses will take care of the babies by herself.
Just keep an eye out for the other adults, it might be better to move the mom and the babies to a cage on their own to avoid stress and protect the babies.
They WILL reproduce, and if they start inbreeding there can be genetic defects... not fair to the mice.... as well as crowded cages are also not good, since it stresses them out (and stressed out mouses can also eat / kill their babies! - just in case you notice the babies are disapearing and don't know where to).
Good luck
2006-12-06 21:44:07 · answer #1 · answered by Lakini 3 · 1⤊ 0⤋
You should be able to see where the mother is swollen. 9 is a lot for one mouse though. You probably have 2 females and 1 male. You need to figure out which one is the male and remove him immediately unless you want some cannabalism going on. And no, mice can't change their genders, they just weren't old enough to reproduce yet.
2006-12-06 19:54:09 · answer #2 · answered by imakillerkiller 1 · 1⤊ 0⤋
you will see the mother with the babies feeding them. pick the adults up and look under them its easy to tell which are males and which are females. i used to have mice that had babies. the mother will do all the work. dont touch the babies untill the stop feeding from the mother or the mother will stop careing for them and probally eat it or let it die.
maybe the adults were to young to breed before now. mice cant change their gender they stay ethier a male or female. sometimes the male will eat the babies so watch for that. if you can find out the gender then it might be good to seperate them unless the male is careing for them.
hope this helps.
2006-12-07 01:20:44 · answer #3 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 1⤋
If you have a rodent saavy vet in your area, I would suggest taking the whole lot in to find out which sex each one is so that you are able to seperate the males from the females.
Baby mice can be weaned as early as three weeks and sexed by then too. You should notice large testicles on the baby boys, but if they're scared, they can suck them up so it's harder to tell. This is where the vet will come in handy again.
Males cannot typically be housed together, but some may be able to.
You can advertise them for adoption on Petfinder.com, too.
2006-12-07 18:47:29 · answer #4 · answered by ShadowWolf 2 · 0⤊ 1⤋
Maybe you should bring them all to the vet to have them checked! Also he/she can advice you about what to do! Some animals can start reproducing very quickly and with 9 babies I am sure they are of mixed sexes...you could end up with a lot more babies very soon!!!
2006-12-06 19:52:53 · answer #5 · answered by INC0GNIT0 5 · 2⤊ 0⤋
We had gerbils like that when I was growing up. We thought we had two males and ended up with tons of babies before we finally got the genders straightened out. They will take care of their babies them selves. Just feed them. Maybe your local pet store will take the babies and give you some store credit. Ours did.
They were fun to watch grow up.
Have fun!
2006-12-07 02:28:40 · answer #6 · answered by beanietara 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
remove the male
or males maybe in your case.
Put him in a different cage.
When the little mice grow up more seperate the males and females again.
So you can probably just take them to the petstore where you bought them and they can tell you which ones are male and female.
I would not give them up for snake food, but that may be just me.
2006-12-06 19:57:40 · answer #7 · answered by buterflikizes20 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
not really you should just give food and water when they grow plus dont carry the babies the moms may eat them(mice tend to do that)
2006-12-06 19:54:04 · answer #8 · answered by Anonymous · 2⤊ 0⤋
Cute little suckers, aren't they?
2006-12-07 01:35:15 · answer #9 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 0⤋
I would get rid of them. Or give them away!
2006-12-06 19:52:36 · answer #10 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 2⤋