# Please, everyone read this....



## moustress (Sep 25, 2009)

All the mousies that I posted pix of before today are ALL DEAD!! 

There; once should be enough.


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## Rhasputin (Feb 21, 2010)

I hope that helps get some stuff of your shoulders.
Be strong!


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## Matt Haslam (Mar 13, 2010)

jeeees twighlight!


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## moustress (Sep 25, 2009)

I was not completely accurate; some of the meeces I showed as babies or young meeces are still around. Sorry. :roll:

Shiprat, what do you mean...or had you not heard? 200 meeces were killed by a malfunction of the space heater or possibly of the idiot chip...


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## Matt Haslam (Mar 13, 2010)

sorry moustress it all sounded gothic to me, thats why i said 'twighlight'. sorry if i was insensitive

i am sorry to hear of your loss.


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## moustress (Sep 25, 2009)

No, I didn't think you being insensitive, Shiprat, not in the least. I just didn't understand your comment at all.

I was just feeling irritated and cranky...fed up and impatient...crabby and cross...I'm getting better, though even in the best of times I'm known to be edgy and a bit snappish.

Please don't feel bad about what you said, like I said, I was just puzzled.


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## JustMouse (Jul 23, 2010)

I'm so sorry. We recently lost three mice, two of which were part of the first three mice that we ever had. They were all under one year old and died due to an aggressive bacterial infection  Everyone else is fine. Luckily the disease didn't strike until our babies were all big enough to fend for themselves. 
I'm sure that your surviving mice are all very strong and will help improve the health and happiness that you hope for in the future


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## moustress (Sep 25, 2009)

Yeah, the surviving 70ish are being spoiled silly. I've paired off a lot of them in separate tanks for breeding, so instead of 60 or so tanks I've got about 23 now. Two more died yesterday; they were my last fawn selfs. Very sad as they are my faves. but, I'm already working on recovering that line by using yellow/red carrying the recessive p, and then I'll breed the offspring to one another to get my red eyed fawn back. The red eyed dilutes are the line I worked on the longest, and I really want them back! I have one marked curly champagne tan buck that I wasn't going to breed before as I'm not real comfortable with having curly meeces, but he's been bred to an marked agouti who's heterozygous in the a locus and p locus, and I may see champagne in that litter if it comes to pass.


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## Rosewood (Oct 7, 2010)

Sorry to hear about that moustress 

I know how you feel, I've had something going around my coloney recently and it has killed off a fair few of them within a few days of contracting it. I hope the rest of yours are okay.


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## moustress (Sep 25, 2009)

No illness in my mousery, thank Goddess. A couple more adult meeces died, were found last night. My last two fawns, dammit! The doe was too old to breed, but I was hoping the buck would survive. He didn't look good, and I wasn't expecting him to make it. The dust is settling and I'm getting back into something like a regular routine in the mousery again. It'll take at least a half a year for me to recreate my fawn line by breeding my surviving yellow satin boys, who carry the pink eyed gene, and then breed the offspring together to get fawns. I hope it's that simple...I can't think of any reason why that won't work. I'll have to do a lot of litters in order to get a couple of meeces with pink eyes. In any case, I started putting breeding pairs together the night after the incident, so I should see babies in large numbers the first week of January. It just really hacks me off that I had everything set up to accomodate the vast numbers I was maintaining, and now this happens. Oh, well, I guess I should be glad I'm dealing with such short generations. If I had lost a bunch of horses in a fire I'd probably feel like slitting my own throat. I'm still in a very black mood, though. I thought I'd feel better as time passes, but I don't.


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## Roland (Aug 17, 2009)

moustress said:


> ...It'll take at least a half a year for me to recreate my fawn line by breeding my surviving yellow satin boys, who carry the pink eyed gene, and then breed the offspring together to get fawns. I hope it's that simple...I can't think of any reason why that won't work. I'll have to do a lot of litters in order to get a couple of meeces with pink eyes.


The chance to have a carrier for p in the offspring of P/p x P/P is 50%. You would double your chances to get p/p in the F2, when you cross the daughters back to the fathers, who are P/p for sure, not to the brothers. 
Good luck!

Best regards, Roland
Chilloutarea Mousery - Tricolor , Splashed , Merle , Recessive Red


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## moustress (Sep 25, 2009)

When you're right, you're right. I have been so deeply affected that I'm not thinking at my clearest. Thank you; I should have realized that myself, but...your kindness is greatly appreciated. I had thought I was recovered from the loss, emotionally, but, no, I'm still just P.O.'ed now instead of just sad. Positive input helps a lot, Roland. It means a lot to me that you are willing to reach out like this even if you think I'm a crackpot in certain areas.

Like I said before, I'm so grateful to have the survivors that I do have I'm afraid my only satin fawn buck that I have left is sterile. His penis wouldn't retract, and his testicles are riding high up in his body, where I suspect it's too warm for sperm production. I gave him a nice massage with some lube last night, followed by a warm compress and got the penis to retract finally; I'm afraid that he was terribly uncomfortable before that. He was such a good boy to let me do all that with hardly any fuss at all, and no biting attempted at all! He's in terrible shape, over all; not sick looking, just bony, with thinned fur. I'm afraid the heat must have damaged some internal organs. Oh, well, I'm doing what I can. He's getting some KMR each night, along with a prolonged cuddle in the pocket of my mousery smock with a piece of polar fleeces in it. I also gave him a young doe for a bedwarmer. It would be a miracle if he recovers enough to father a litter, so I'm not expecting that to happen. I just want whatever time he has left to be free of pain. Mousies are so stoic that sometimes they don't show it...if I think he's feeling bad, I'm put him down. He's my only fawn satin, though...still I must not be selfish keeping him if he's not enjoying his life.

I'm still working on moving away from disaster. I thought it was getting better...I don't know if it ever will. I suspect that this will stay will me a a little kernel of heartbreak, but that ultimately should make me a more conscientious mousekeeper. Gotta try my best to pick up all the positives and put them together to make a better tomorrow.

My love to any and all of you who read this and understand my heartbreak. Keeping mousies has always been a thing of heart, first and foremost, than an occasion for self aggrandizement or recognition or scientific curiousity. I'm even a sap for spiders, beetles, earthworms..... meeces are so vibrantly alive that I feel restored and energized when I'm with them, holding them, playing with them...living without them is something I don't even want to consider.


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## Roland (Aug 17, 2009)

Hi mousestress,

it is a sad story, but fortunately mice are very productive. Try to see it as a chance to think about your goals in breeding and what kind of varities you want to focus on.

All the best, Roland


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## SiamMeece (Sep 21, 2010)

Hi Moustress,
Sorry to hear about your loss. Hopefully 2011 will be a good mousie year. Keep your chin up


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## jessilynn (Jul 9, 2010)

If this fawn buck means so much to your lines, why dont you take him to the vet? They may be able to give you some insight and medication to help him recover.


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## moustress (Sep 25, 2009)

Roland:

You are absolutely right; I could be up to my ears with meeces by spring. I have stopped short of pairing up every mousie possible. Quantity is always easy to achieve; it's one of the things that meeces do best. Four months from now I may be well on my way to recovering the quality represented in the mousies I had chosen for breeding before the incident. I lost all my best stock but have acceptable alternatives to pursue. I have never been one to shrink from difficulty; the situation represents a challenge and I am all 'can do'.


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## webzdebs (Mar 29, 2010)

so sorry for your losses


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## moustress (Sep 25, 2009)

Thanks, hon.


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