Allowing a mother rat to breed continuously will lead to her early death and her babies won't be very healthy so they aren't going to be worth much to you as herp food. You can leave a younger female with the mother and that female will act as a baby sitter for the mother. That will give the mother rat time to eat her food, drink her water, and get some rest away from the litter. Feeding the weak to your herps will help you to produce a strong healthy colony of rats. Avoiding the mistakes being made by pet breeders not only will help you breed a better rat for your herp but you might find a small market for selling your rats as pets.
Dumbo rats have large ears set on the sides of their heads and are highly sought after by fanciers.
Spotted like a Dalmatian dog, banded eyes like a raccoon, satin coats, are prized possessions of rat fanciers. Colors such as orange, apricot, amber, dark or powder blue, cream, beige, lilac, coffee, true black, chocolate, champagne, a white coat with black eyes, and hairless are all prized by fanciers. You might want to find out if rats are in demand as pets in your area. Some people now do breed rats for both pets and feeders because the fancies are highly sought after by pet rat owners. If you sold healthy rats into the pet rat trade, you'd be helping to widen that gene pool which would be a great benefit to all, the pet as well as the feeder.