C57BLK6 Mice Keep Eating Pups

[Gryffindor20]

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Okay, so I keep trying to breed these C57BLK6 mice (which are homozygous knockouts for a certain gene). But they keep eating all of their pups (litters are 10-12 pups). My cages are not overcrowded, and I don't even open the cage for the first 48 hours, but it doesn't seem to help. These mice are crazy. Any ideas to de-stress the mothers?

 

[AlteredScale]

Okay, so I keep trying to breed these C57BLK6 mice (which are homozygous knockouts for a certain gene). But they keep eating all of their pups (litters are 10-12 pups). My cages are not overcrowded, and I don't even open the cage for the first 48 hours, but it doesn't seem to help. These mice are crazy. Any ideas to de-stress the mothers?

My old lab manager used to switch the pups. At the time it was a risk worth taking since there were other cages with pups surviving of the breed we wanted. What you want to do is cover and try and while pups in the wood shed bedding of the cage you are switching to to try and mask their scent from the new mum.


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[Gryffindor20]

My old lab manager used to switch the pups. At the time it was a risk worth taking since there were other cages with pups surviving of the breed we wanted. What you want to do is cover and try and while pups in the wood shed bedding of the cage you are switching to to try and mask their scent from the new mum.


Sent from my iPhone using SDN mobile

Thanks. I was thinking that same thing, since I've been digging around the internet for solutions, so I'm going to try it (maybe with a CD1 surrogate mother?) the next time I get a litter.