How We Breed Our Own Feeders, Rodent Building Tour!! AME v35b
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- Опубліковано 3 жов 2024
- One of the most important aspects of being successful breeding snakes for a living is making sure you always have all the feeders you need! In this video I show how we produce our own rodents and share a few tips for creating a successful rodent building and breeding operation on any scale!
I love the way you explain everything so well and take care of it so professionally. ❤
Thank you so much!
I’m actually impressed by how humane this all looks and so clean and organized this is.
Thank you!!
Awesome rodent facility, there’s a lot of good tips in this one! Great video brother.
Glad you enjoyed it!
Phenomenal bro! Great video and amazing system you got going on... from the water, the rodent cycle, the wall/hallway! Awesome!
Thanks bro! The idea that me showing how we do things by giving a tour of the buildings as a whole 100% came from you when we spoke the other day! Thank you for the advice I’m glad we can learn more together!!!
@@americanmadeexoticsllc I always say it bro. Learn together, grow together, succeed together! Glad I was able to shine light on something for you! You're definitely killing it man, and people can learn a ton from you! Keep it going 🫡🤙
Awesome facility. The water lines were a great idea.
Yes it was! I can't believe I stood there all those years holding a hose watching them fill up one at a time!
Cool to know you’re a fishkeeper as well! Those floats are great!
Breeding fish was actually my first “business”. When I was in middle school I was breeding all kinds of shell dwellers and other tangs. Back when you’d list fry on aqua bid and wait for somebody to mail you a money order and I would have them packed and ready to go after school for my mom to drive me to usps to drop them off 😂 I can’t remember a time in my life not having fish tanks
this is goals right here, i need to implement all this. Thanks for the info Matt
I hope it helps!!
cool!
Thanks!
great videos. learned a lot of new things that ive never seen mentioned in other vids.
Glad it was helpful! Thanks for watching!
@@americanmadeexoticsllc I've been trying to do 1.3 ASF in the same tub and I find the handful of my colonies have newly wean dehydrated/dying off. Do you experience this? Could it be overcrowded?
@@JaeSleepywood You ma y have to figure out which ones are just not good parents and selectively cull them off. I do not have that problem but I have selectively kept only the good producers for many years now!
@@americanmadeexoticsllc thanks for the help. Do you use spring loaded or diaphragm nozzles for the ASF?
@@JaeSleepywood spring loaded all the way! I haven't used diaphragm ones in a looooong time and i've been very happy with the spring loaded nozzles from reptile basics compared to the old edstrom diaphragm ones I was using.
Great video man!
Glad you liked it!
Bro, I flood my house twice a week. I can’t be responsible for any liquid that fills. I will 100% of the time forget I’m doing a water change on a tank or swapping out a reservoir … come back an hour later to a mess. Love that set up!
Yuuup that’s why we built the mixing station with these float valves. I flooded the kitchen a few times waiting to fill a trash can with rodi water to mix salt into 😅😅😅
Real dope video alot of good ideas. Appreciate it
No problem!! Thank you for watching!
Great breakdown. I def need to get a system figured out like that and tag em for age etc
I've tried a few different ways to maintain a rodent colony and I found this was just the easiest way for me to keep up with it. If I cull a few every time I clean Its not that bad to sit x amount to the side to refill the tubs at the end. It prevents the situation of letting the rodents get so old the production starts going down and then its hard to keep small/medium fms to replace them because you need the feeders and production is already down from them being old. This keeps things constantly flowing with getting new girls in the rotation. Also, if we stay on top of it and cull the adults young enough I'm still able to get some of my ball python adults to eat them!
Great vid bro! Idk how I haven’t seen it until today! That water system is definitely going to be set up in our building
Man the water system is a game changer for real! SOO many wasted hours holding a water hose watching them slowly fill over the years.
Thank you for your video! I learned a lot. Could you share with us what type of reverse osmosis attachment you use to filter your water?
I do have reverse osmosis set up at the house for our reef tanks but for the rodents they just have some good well water with just a sediment filter on it.
Okay! I misheard on your video. What type of sediment filter do you attach? Thank you again
Great video. I got some great ideas from you for my rabbit set up and my black soldier fly set up. Mice love black soldier flies..lol. I have some in my fly shed that steal any that I drop on the floor.
I’m glad I could help!
I apologise in advance if this is a stupid question but why wouldn't you want a loose rodent in that room? Could it be that it may chew through stuff or something like that
No such thing as a stupid question! The rodents are raised to know the water comes from the nipples. A loose rat will get thirsty and associate the nipples with water and since it can’t get inside another tub to get to a nipple it will chew a water line and get a drink and move on… leaving behind a leaking water line to flood the tubs below it. That is just on the short term. A single loose rat can be devastating to a rodent building besides the water lines they can get into the walls, chew wires etc. the aluminum we have along the bottom of the walls helps prevent climbing or chewing into the walls but still we make a habit of not letting rodents get loose or stay loose.
You can also use a lawn sprinkler valve even from Home Depot and you can have it set on a timer to fill the water for 10 minutes or so once a day, so that you could even be semi vacation proof.
That would be a great idea for a vacation!
I can’t imagine how dusty it gets with the pellets in that size of facility.. my garage is dusty after 2-3 weeks with the 15 tubs I run. How do you manage all that dust?
Well ed is in there pretty much 40 hours a week and we aren’t afraid to get the whole crew in there with shop vacs and brooms to tackle that dust. It truly is never ending though!
Thanks for sharing this with us, Matt . That water system you have is top-notch really cool cause man do rats go through water. I have over 200 rats here. That i breed there on the 2nd floor, so I have to use water bottles not trying to have a flood. It will be a mess. Can't keep them in my basement due to no air flow, but there in a room with 4 windows. Each window has window fans in them blowing air out & in 24/7. Fresh air is a must. My question for you is, what is the best thing to do about the dust? Right now, I use carbon filters on the back of my fans it builds up fast, looking to see what others do. I also purchase a big air purifier that pretty much does nothing
Thanks! Unfortunately the dust isn't something I have found an easy fix for other than we have a couple of shop vacs and brooms and it's a never ending job of sweeping and hitting racks, walls, fans etc with the shop vacs. It truly is a never ending job. If you find something that works to control the dust definitely let us know!! I'm lucky in the aspect that I have my rodent building on 3 acres in the country so all that dust just spits out the fan outside and is gone with the wind.
To prevent flooding deaths drill a hole in the bottom of each rat tub and glue an appropriate size washer to prevent chewing. A tube to the floor will prevent the water going into the tub below
That is a good idea I have heard of people using grommets in the tubs. Knock on wood its been a long time since we have had a flood but we make good practice of if we see a rodent hop out of a tub we drop everything until we find it! Usually pretty easy with the racks off the walls. So most of the leaks we get are slow drips from nozzles which we can just see a damp tub that should be clean and swap the nipples. Again, knock on lots of wood! lol
Thanks for sharing buddy I am about to start breeding rats myself I know I am going to have some questions for you I am working on building my first rat rack with the concrete mixing tubs
you are welcome! I hope the video helps and we are always here to answer questions!
I have a very similar setup with the float system I took it one step further and put trays under each one of my tubs in case there's a leak at the tub drain them outside like a water Peter Pan then I put the whole system on a sprinkler I timed the system to only fill one third of the tub at a time every 12 hours that eliminates even having to turn the water on just watching the system from cameras and water sensors will notify me if there's an overflow
I have thought about doing something like this as well for when we go out of town and such but we have no life outside of the animals really so somebody is in there a few hours a day so not to bad to manually do it! The automation would be GREAT for shows!
Thank you for this informative video. Its always interesting to see everyone's set ups and how they differ and are the same. I especially appreciated the ASF section as I have been experimenting with different size colonies in different size tubs, and the 1.3 in the same size tub as you have is one of them.
What is the size of your rat room/building?
Awesome I am very glad it could help!! I believe the rodent building is 16 x 56 and it really cranks out some rodents!
Dream setup those metal racks one day i hope to get their so expensive sadly
Slow and steady wins the race!! This is 15 years of grinding at it and growing very slowly!! Just keep grinding and you’re dreams will come true!
@americanmadeexoticsllc6609 I did have another question what do yall do with all the bedding after ? This is something nobody talks about in rat breeding would love to hear what yall do with it after ?
@@Bobby-fs3el we have a tractor with a front end loader parked at the back door at our work station where we scrape all the old bedding into. We have a dumpster on site that the bucket can dump into perfectly!
@americanmadeexoticsllc6609 thanks for getting back to me good idea im right now spreading it through my yard but won't I finish my last 8 racks idk if my yards gonna handle all that haha
While still in their parents' tub, can the weaned rats reach the food and water? It looks a bit high for them.
I am asking because I am setting up my own and I am lost with some technical details. The tubs I want to use are slightly taller than yours too.
I have see. Weans hanging from the screen lid eating. I remove them to a different tub once they are able to stop nursing though.
Mice are extremely tolerant!
Yes mine have always done just fine in the same room as the rats
Thats a nice rat house, whats your production looking like weekly? Also, whats the link to the iverflow shutoff inst the water buckets?
we produce thousands of rodents a month. We have a pretty large snake collection and we manage to supply our own collections as well as several other customers collections! We get the float valves from bulk reef supply. There may be a better source for them but I had worked with these before and knew I could get them quickly. www.bulkreefsupply.com/ro-float-valve.html?queryID=bf78da26d6526f47e2c6443b0b4f5342&objectID=852&indexName=brs_prod_m2_default_products
Out of curiosity looking for a new grow out/ holding system who makes that holding system you have with the inside troughs and nipples in the back I can’t seem to find it anywhere thanks for any information on it
That rack is from freedom breeder.
Great video man. We are fixing to do an automated water system, hopefully before we leave for Tinley. What is the configuration of the watering lead from the main line? Did you use 1" PEX?
I just have 3/4in pex attached to the pvc main line. If you reach out on social media I can get a close up pic for you of how I went from pvc to pex but I’m out of the shop for the weekend at a show right now.
This is so official 🤘💯💯
Thank you!
Great video and awesome set up ! What thermostats do you use to run your fans?
The thermostats come attached to the fans
How to you clean tubs when there's babies in them?
Our room flows so we cull the first 12 tubs of the oldest animals every week. This starts our cleaning cycle and as we clean those 12 tubs we move down the line moving rodents from their dirty tubs into the clean tubs in front of them. We move the adults and babies with them as we clean. We clean down the row starting with the oldest rodents and finishing with the youngest. Because we cull the oldest 12 tubs of rodents to start the cleaning cycle when we finish the rats that leaves us with 12 clean empty tubs at the very end of the line. We tag the fist 2 tubs with the date (in case one clip gets knocked off some how) and we set 12 groups up we make out of the medium rats we have from the last weeks pull. This finishes our cleaning cycle with 12 brand new groups. It keeps our rats from ever getting to old and keeps our production pretty even week to week because the rodents are always equally in the same age roughly down the line from peak producing to first timers and everything in between
what about in winter to keep it warm
In the inter time I have space heaters in the middle of the floor set to 63 and the exhaust fans are on thermostats set to 70. I have 1 exhaust fan on a time to cut on every hour during the day for a few minutes to air it out and off at night. There are so many rodents in the building and it is insulated well the heaters don’t cut on to much and the fans actually kick in pretty frequently from the body heat getting the building over 70. I do put extra bedding in the winter to be sure they have plenty to build nests to keep the babies warm.
What are you guys using for valve clips on the old school Fb Racks?
Those older racks are ars racks. The valves kind of just stuff through those diamond shaped holes and get pretty stuck in there.
What age do you pull weans of rats and mice?
we do not have a set age because it seems like they mature at different rates depending on how much "competition" for resources the litters have. We go by how they visually look. If they are walking around with their heads fully up right we wean them out. It never hurts for them to have a little longer access to the ability to nurse but they don't do well if you pull early before their heads are held upright.
When do you remove weaned rats from the mother? Do you keep a calendar for something like 22 days or do you decide when they ready to move out by looking at them?
They mature at different rates. We do not keep track of date from pinky to wean we just use our eyes. If the head is lifted up and it’s walking around with its head up we wean it. If it’s still not holding its head up as much we let it keep nursing and take it as still in crawler form.
where are you guys located and what is the temperatures during the summer?
North Carolina and it hits triple digits here in the summer
@americanmadeexoticsllc6609 thanks I'm in Vegas and struggling with AC but it's 110-115 a day out now. My productivity has completely tanked
I have run no ac like this for several years now. Wind moving and good airflow is very important. It's hot out right now and our production is better than ever, even with no AC!
Do you know if i can buy mazuri f6 in croatia or in europe?
we get ours at feed supply stores that carry products for farms
Thanks for the video, very informative! After you remove weaned rats from their mother's tub, how long can you keep males and females all together at the same tub? Also, could you have a tub with adult male rats and house a bunch of them together?
my male rats stay in with those females for life. I make a harem of male and females and never separate them. They raise multiple generations of babies all together like one giant family. I'm not sure about the large breeder male tub. I never separate my colonies.
@@americanmadeexoticsllc Thanks!
@@americanmadeexoticsllc How often do you change your rats and mice bedding?
@@leviathanblue6561 We have 1 guy working 40 hours a week in there and that allows us to get completely through the cycle in less than a week and start back at the beginning as is. Then we have 3 other people that are helping out in there throughout the week so it probably puts as at cleaning them a little more often than needed but it's a lot more enjoyable a job to be cleaning tubs that aren't dirty to the max yet.
@@americanmadeexoticsllc Much appreciate the info!
Hi guys where did you get the X-Large concrete tubes
I got them at home depot years ago!
@@americanmadeexoticsllc did you ask for them or find them in store
They uses to just be out on the shelf near the concrete
What tubs or tub size are you using?
They are the 70 series size tubs for the rats.
So you cull your rats at 6 month's old? Or did i hear that wrong? I used to breed but never at that level.Maybe 15 concrete tubs of breeders. Keeping track of age is a good tip
I honestly TRY to not even let them get that old. The younger I get them culled the smaller they are and more likely to get adult ball pythons to eat them. If we let them get to old none of my adult ball pythons will eat them and then we struggle to find a person around us with a large enough collection of large snakes that can buy them in the quantity we are culling. I've definitely thought about getting back into Boas just because it was always nice to park the buckets of culled adults in front of the boas and make them disappear no problem!
What temperature are your fans set to turn on?
The fans kick on about 70 degrees.
@americanmadeexoticsllc6609 so you keep your room at 70? What range of temp do you keep and does these fans keep it 70 during say 90 degrees? Thank you for responding!!
@@americanmadeexoticsllc also what thermostat and fans do you use?
Absolutely not. The fans kick on at 70. If it’s hot outside it’s hot in the rodent building. There’s just a LOT of air moving around. Comparable to sitting in a car with no ac and windows up you would die, but with all the windows down cruising down the interstate it’s gonna be hot but not bad.
Gable exhaust fans designed to cool attics from Lowe’s. I run 7 whole house fans on my building
This is insane , if you weren't supporting your own snakes how large of a setup would you need to make a good living breeding feeders for customers
We produce a few thousand rats a week. Multiply that by going rate of rodents in your area.
Beetween 8 and 12 bucks for a medium size rat in Australia