Failure to Thrive

In every project that B tackles, there comes learning that he did not expect. His current litter of mice have all met the definition of "failure to thrive." The mother has abandoned the litter. As of this morning, 9 of the 12 pups have died. We do not know for sure the reason. At this point we are assuming because the pups nostrils never developed, therefore making it impossible for them to nurse and breath at the same time. Without nursing they could not grow, and without nursing we think the mother abandoned them. Another possibility is, most litters are only 6-8 pups, and this litter was unusually large at 12. It is possible that the mother can just not produce enough milk to sustain the babies, and once they started to die she abandoned the entire litter. Lastly we have considered the temperatures - which dropped into the 30s yesterday. But B rigged up a light on the cage to warm the air and pups have continued to die. B is trying to dropper feed the last 3 pups, in hopes that he can get them to feed and grow. Yes, he has moved them into the house for what he termed as "needing constant supervision."
Economically, since B is raising these mice for profit. This has been a good lesson in, don't always count your chickens before they hatch. Thankfully he doesn't have a customer waiting for this litter. He understands now that sometimes there will be profit lost to things that are out of his control. And that at some point he needs to start freezing the 'pinkies' (newborns). Had he done that with this litter, he would have 12 pinkies to sell vs. struggling to get 3 pups to the weaned stage. Yes, in very project there is learning!