# New litter! (Merle x Lindt)



## We Love Mouse (Jan 5, 2011)

Lindt, my ruby eye argente self longhair doe just gave birth today! From the first head count I think there are around 13 pups with red, black and ruby eyes. Their father, Merle, is a broken blue shorthair, so I'm expecting some longhair-carrier self/pied argente and agouti, and possibly black, blue, dove, or something else. I'm planning to keep some boys to bred back to the mum to get more longhairs and getting start with a longhair line.

However, I think that litter is too large for a doe and a nanny to handle, and their size are small compare to last litter of 7. I do actually find some that are a bit smaller, but not as small as a runt. I considered culling some of them, but still not sure who, when or with which method yet(I assume that the rest should be discuss in the culling forum, hope it is okay for me to join) + small babies are so hard to sex.

Picture will come very soon!


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## candycorn (Oct 31, 2011)

well...she definatly can't handle 13 as well. She only has 10 nipples. I would cull the smallest of them if you can't sex them yet. But really take a look at pinkie pictures and then compair the babies. Put them in piles...definatly girls, definatly boys...and maybes! LOL!


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## We Love Mouse (Jan 5, 2011)

So I have to cull some then, because that number is also too high for me. Would it be alright to cull on the 3rd-5th day? I don't want Lindt to suffer from that many babies, but I also want to wait for their markings (I'm aiming for piebalds). 
I hope I could do better with sexing this time because last time, all of the babies look like males until I'm sure that I have 5 does and 2 bucks on day 7 or so. It seems to be very easy in pictures (but opposite in real life) :lol:


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## Frizzle (Oct 6, 2011)

What do you plan on using the females for? I'd do a 2 males, 3 females ratio. What can I say, boys are pigs! :lol:


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## We Love Mouse (Jan 5, 2011)

I'm planning to keep the females to increase the number of longhairs, just in case that their mum couldn't be bred for whatever reason. 
I have to agree with you, Frizzle, boys are very greedy with milk and grew up larger. Boys in my last litter are now bigger than some of my full grown does (probably because they're brindles too):shock:

The bad news is, the smallest baby just died this morning and Lindt doesn't show much interest in caring them at all. She left them with another doe(who's not pregnant or have any babies) and wander off somewhere else. 
I was worried that they might not survive; some of them doesn't have any milk bands while some of them have. What should I do now? I never have this issue with my hamsters and the last litter before. I don't want to lose all of them T-T (or am I being paranoid?)


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## thewesterngate (May 22, 2012)

Do you have any other does that are nursing? I recently had an entire litter go down the drain because the mother wouldn't care for them, I waited too long to see if she would, so by the time I fostered them off only one survived. :/ Even that one might need to be culled now.


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## We Love Mouse (Jan 5, 2011)

No, I only have her that's nursing. Right now the litter still doing fine with milk bellies so I assume that she might nurse them while I'm not around. I usually only see her in the nest for like 2-3 times a day, the other time she's walking around or sleep in the other place. 
The nanny, however, seems to think that she's the mom and guard the nest almost all the time(but not being aggressive towards Lindt at all. they're fine together).

Babies update : some of the black eyes start to develop skin colour this morning, which could means that they're either black or agouti. I'll have a look at them again this evening. No pictures again, sorry!


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