Jack Russell and Pet Rat Advice

dottygirl

Hi my daughter would like a pet rat (No idea why!). My concern is we have a lovey Jack Russell and I worry that if he smelt the rat he would try and eat it. Is this likely? The rat would live in my dd bedroom. Would it be fair on our dog? Dont want him to spend his time trying to get to the rat! Must admit not keen on pet rat idea lol x

GonzoAston

I have a Patterdale, which is not that dissimilar to a JR tbh. I wouldnt get a minutes rest if I had a rat in the house. He would be constantly trying to kill it.

Maybe not true in all cases, but terriers and furry rodents, I would say no, or be very aware.

krlyr

Depends on the dog. Mine are not terriers but both do chase rabbits, squirrels, etc, one is very prey-driven. When I had rats, they were kept 2 doors away upstairs (dogs were never allowed upstairs anyway as I don't want to excerbate the hip issues that both breeds are prone to) and we never had any problems. On the odd occassion the dogs needed to sleep upstairs, the rats were moved to another room, or to the hallway outside the bedroom, and the dogs didn't obsess over trying to get to them.
I did purposely buy an all-metal cage to reduce the likelihood of an escapee rat (dogs would definately catch/kill one if it wandered loose downstairs) so do consider that.
Also bear in mind that rats are a sociable species and do far better in a minimum of pairs, so if you let her get rats, please encourage her to get two - the fancyrats forum is a good place to do her research before she buys/adopts (and she'll find much better sources to get the rats as opposed to a petshop - they're the equivelant of a puppyfarm or puppy dealers). They need a fairly large cage too as they're active animals, if you google the "Freddy 2" then that's about the smallest you'd want to use - the bigger the better!

cubegame

Dogs do have a fairly well developed sense of their pack. If you associate with the creature they will realise it is part of the pack. It might be more difficult with an older dog but we've had hamsters ever since our Westie was a pup and he isn't bothered by them.

Person_one

I had rats in a house with a terrier for a while.

I'm afraid they do want to eat them, very very much! But if you are incredibly vigilant about keeping the rats well away from the dog and never letting him in the same room as them it is do-able. Terriers aren't scenthounds, he might be able to smell them but his chasing instinct will only kick in when he sees them scurrying around temptingly.

I feel I should warn you though that rats are not as easy as you might think! For one thing they should never be kept alone, they are social animals and a group of at least 3 to 4 is really the minimum I'd ever have. For that you'll need a pretty sizeable cage, the Ferplast Jenny is really the smallest you can get away with, but as that can be easily chewed and escaped from in a house with a dog I'd go for an Explorer or a Savic Royal Suite which are escape proof, google them, they're huge! Also, rats require time outside the cage every day to 'free range', play and bond with their owner so that might be an issue with the dog.

Rats make lovely pets though, they're very intelligent and much more interactive than say, a hamster or a gerbil. How old is your daughter?

Mrs_Arcanum

Friends of DD keep 2 Jack Russels, 1 Colly cross, cats, rabbits, rats and hamsters and have a horse. The rats came after the Jack Russells IIRC.

zaksmum

The lovely Jack Russell next door turns into the Destroyer where rats are concerned. He slipped his lead and hurtled across the park once and seized and killed a rat within half a second.

No way could he live with a rat in the house. He'd make it his life's mission to kill it.

Barcode

We have a 4 month old Border Terrier, one pygmy hedgehog, and one lemming. The lemming is on a high shelf and I don't think she knows he exists - she's been completely oblivious to his scurrying around and nightly wheeling.

With the hedgehog we socialized her from the day we brought her home. She regards him as a curiosity, and since she got a face full of quills she hasn't gone too close again :rotfl:

Early socialization and it should hopefully be o.k. The hog comes out for an hour most nights and they have been known to sit on the sofa together. Always supervised. When we go out, his cage is securely locked just in case her predatory instincts get the better of her.

Mely

The slightest slip in vigilance and it would be goodbye for poor ratty.

krlyr

Mely wrote: »

The slightest slip in vigilance and it would be goodbye for poor ratty.

Not necessarily. Human error does occur so I think it's sensible to have precautions in place. Like with our rats, we had a metal cage so no chance we could miss them having chewed through a back corner of the cage base - averting human error #1. We tended to mostly use the top door, which was the whole roof of the cage, so if someone forgot to fasten it properly, it was unlikely they'd open it because of the weight of it, protection against human error #2.
Our bedroom door was shut 99% of the time - it might be left open if we were home but never when we were out, so if the rats did manage to escape, they were confined to one room. Then the door at the bottom of the stairs was almost always shut - but even when it was open, the dogs knew not to go up the stairs, so physical prevention and training to proect against human error again. If both doors were ever left open and the dogs got up, the cage design meant that doors couldn't be knocked open (they were springed so had to be physically pulled to open them) and also the base of the cage clipped on to the top part so it couldn't seperate even if they knocked it off the box it sat on.
Playtime for the rats was always upstairs and always in a playpen we built - so no chance of them slipping out of the door if someone opened it. If we had to take the rats downstairs (e.g. out to the car to go to the vets), they went straight from their cage into a pet carrier, we didn't risk them jumping or falling out of our hands or the dogs jumping up at us.

Mistakes can be made and I'm not saying the above was totally foolproof (but it worked for us, no unfortunate incidents between dogs and rats) either but no more so than saying OP shouldn't have a dog because it might run out of the front door and kill a driver in an RTA. Common sense, and the age/maturity of the daughter could make it safe enough to keep small animals in the house so I don't think the idea should be ruled out entirely, just taken into consideration (along with all the other pros and cons of rats as pets - not just the size of the cage or that they need company, but the expense for example - they're unfortunately quite prone to respiratory issues and tumours so vet treatment can get costly, with antibiotics, tumour removal, etc.)

rubberbiscuit

Ive got 3 rats and 3 dogs and the only way it worked for me was to have the rats upstairs in a seperate room. Both my Chihuahuas couldnt have cared less but my mini daschshund cross was a nightmare and would stand by the cage and bark and whine constantly so I had to move them.
In fact I dont think I would get rodents again with my current dog, I feel bad they have to be stuck in a back bedroom rather then somewhere more sociable.:(