Mouse trying to mate with his brother?

by Ink1Green Tue 15 Oct 2019, 8:59 am

Hi hello! I'm new here, and new to caring for mice, so please bare with my lack of knowledge!

I have two adorable brothers called Merry and Pippin. They are both clearly bonded with one another, and become distressed is I take them out of eye shot of one another.

However, yesterday afternoon, Pippin has been stress grooming and didn't want to come out to play, and last night I heard him and merry making a lot of noise. I assumed they were playing, but this morning I noticed pippin chasing merry fairly relentlessly, and when I came home from college I noticed that Pippin was pinning merry down and mounting him. I also noticed merry has a Wet patch near his tail and I really hoped it's not what I think it is. I have also noticed pippins testes are rather engorged.

Is this natural behaviour? If it isn't how can I stop it?

by Robin~ Tue 15 Oct 2019, 10:12 am

Hello!

I think it would be best if you separated them. Male mice often don’t get along well in the long run as they are so dominant with each other, so separating while the fighting isn’t too severe would be much safer.

Unfortunately there isn’t really anything you can do to curb this behavior; it’s just in their blood to fight other males for territory. Just be sure to give each by plenty of social time with you and set their cages close together so they can still chat if they’d like Smile

As for the larger testes, they just hang out a little more in hotter weather is all Smile

by Ink1Green Tue 15 Oct 2019, 10:16 am

They have been fine up until this point, and they are 5 months old. And it doesn't seem to be aggressive. There is no biting etc. I'd hate to separate them when they rely on one another so much.

Also it's quite cold here right now.

Could it just be a testosterone spike?

by SilverThistle Wed 16 Oct 2019, 9:12 pm

I would also recommend separating them, I breed mice and when it's time to separate the litter by gender I keep the males together until they start picking on each other. I've never had 2 males stay together past a few months, they always start fighting.

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Mouse trying to mate with his brother?

Mouse trying to mate with his brother?

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Re: Mouse trying to mate with his brother?

Re: Mouse trying to mate with his brother?

Re: Mouse trying to mate with his brother?