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[rebeccalg]

I have all of my rats in a little rabbit hutch in the backyard. They all live quite happily together in a big familly. Rats are actualy one of the few animals that don't mind if you touch their babies. So don't worry about scent transfer.
Four weeks after the babies are born you can ween them. I keep the weened babies in a seperate enclosure for a few weeks, the mum will be pregnant again almost as soon as the babies have been taken away. When the new babies are born and weened I put the older litter back in the cage. The females of the first litter come into season between 6-8 weeks of age, so your collection should multiply rather rapidly.
One of my two remaining original babies has just had a litter two days after the mother had her third litter. The other original baby is also pregnant.
Rats make great mothers and I was amazed to discover yesterday that both mothers take turns at feeding all the babies!
My biggest tip is rotate the babies! They wont ween themselves and it will slow down your preproduction rate if you dont take the babies out. But its ok to have a big happy family of rats all living together.