How Do You Source Your Prey?

So how does everyone acquire their snakes meals? I know a lot of larger operations breed their own rats/ mice. I have been buying mine from a local company that does a great job, but I’m getting enough snakes that breeding is starting to look tempting.
If you are a smaller breeder, how do you get your prey animals?
If you are larger, how has your success been with breeding your own? Is there a certain cost benefit? And at what size collection do you recommend starting to breed your own?
Thanks for any input.

I am not a larger breeder by any mean I have always kept my entire collection between 60 and 75 animals however it was clear from the start that breeding my own feeders would be a necessity.

I have always been to scared rely on someone else to come through for me on a weekly basis and know many people that had a supplier and things happened so they could only partially fulfill the demand or have delays, and while with adults it’s not an issue you can always make them skip a few meals, when baby season comes around you don’t have that luxury.

So I breed rats and mice this way I have always the right prey on end when needed.

I have a rat room with several rat rack and one mice rack and I have been doing this for 12 years now producing 5K+ a year in feeders.

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Thanks so much for the insight! I’ll have about 15 balls at the end of this year and might expand a little on that next year… Very good point on baby season. Do you sell some of your supply as well, or is it solely for your collection?

I only breed for my collection (breeding feeders is not my favorite thing so I breed what I need), when I have surplus when females start going off feed during breeding season I euthanize and froze my surplus, same when the rats reach their optimum size. And of course because of that I keep a few animals on F/T this way no waste.

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