# why do hairless rat doe's have trouble producing milk?



## RatTail (Feb 27, 2010)

i struck up a chat with my breeder who told me the male rat im getting came from

a male hairless and a female rex.

and she told me that female hairless have trouble nursing babies.

why is that?

the hairless seem just as healthy as a furred rat they just need more warmth and nail clipping so they dont scratch themselves.

a rex rat has curled whiskers and a tailless rat is...well...tailless .and yet they seem to reproduce (not 100% about the tailless reproducing successfully)


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## lilspaz68 (Feb 24, 2007)

True genetic hairless rats (different from the more common double rex) often do have lactation issues. It seems to be hormonal...since hormones are what tell a doe to produce milk, and suckling encourages more milk production.

http://www.reproduction-online.org/cgi/content/full/133/4/827

Tailless rats or manx are incredibly difficult to breed, and should NOT be bred by anyone on a whim. They can have some horrible issues (we were discussing this on Goosemoose recently if anyone wants the link). I do know one ethical breeder, and his does are x-rayed before they are bred to make sure they can safely give birth, as most cannot. Even then getting manx babies in a litter is hard to achieve.


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## RatTail (Feb 27, 2010)

i dont even own a tailless and wouldnt breed them what im getting at as it in and of itself doesn seem healthy as they cant regulate body temp the same and the birthing difficulties and yet they produce milk

i just read an article that stated (in a rat fancy book) that the reason hairless cant always produce enough milk is because they do tend to burn energy faster than that of a normal rat.

so if you were to keep a female under a heat lamp and feed her higher quality food than a normal rat with more crude protein she should theoretically have no problems nursing.


the main problem im told isnt that they cant produce milk at all but they cant produce ENOUGH.

which could very well be because they run so hot


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## lilspaz68 (Feb 24, 2007)

Umm...usually rat books are old and have outdated information. What book are you referring to?


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## RatTail (Feb 27, 2010)

it was my cousin's a newer release 2008 or 2009 i think it was called the guide to fancy rats but im not 100% sure of the books title


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## lilspaz68 (Feb 24, 2007)

i cannot read inside of that one, it might have a lot of good information but its unlikely to have the right information on the strange issues rats can have.

from ratguide.com (this site should be your friend)

Hairless

Some types of hairless genes are: nude , fz (fuzzy), hr (hairless), and the uncommon rowlette nude (rnu). Some of these recessive hairless genes can result in problems with lactating , mothering skills, and/or lowered immune system function.. Some breeders have expressed that out crossing to furred rats and breeding hairless only to hairless carriers eliminates or greatly reduces these problems. 

this is another wonderful learning site

http://www.ratbehavior.org/CoatTypes.htm#HairProduction


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