Rats...Do they make good pets?

Person_one

Soot2006 wrote: »

All my rats have come from rescue centres -- they often get entire newborn litters + mum dumped on their doorstep

I had considered rescuing but I'm afraid I'm too selfish. I was so upset to only have my last rats for 3.5 years I couldn't cope with getting older ones and losing them sooner!

However, if they get newborns left, that would be perfect. I'll have a google.

Thanks

Abcynthia

Hey there

Visit the forum fancy-rats.co.uk. I've had 18 rats over my life and always went there for advice. There will be rescue litters etc advertised on there and plenty of people to give you a clue. To be honest the pet shop might be good, but you still never know if that baby rat came from a rodent farm to begin with. 3.5 years is an amazing age for a rat.I think these days more and more rats are only living 2 odd years. Its a shame! Anyway the people on there are also usually happy to organise what they call a rat train to try and arrange a way of getting the rats nearer to you. I had it done for me!
Good luck!

Person_one

Thanks Abcynthia, I'll head over and have a look.

Are rats really not living as long? I wonder why that's happening.

Fire_Fox

Bad breeding? Diet/ nutrition?

Abcynthia

I think you are right on the first point about bad breeding fire fox. Tumours are extremely common now. This is one of the many things rat breeders are desperaty battling against. They are trying to get healthy lines.

There is a lady called alison from newcastle who has written a book called the scuttling gourmet. It is a very detailed and in depth look into rat nutrition and she has came up with a diet called the shunamite diet. I would recommend it to any rat owner. I think you can buy it from a website called rat warehouse. The way the shunamite diet is made you end up with a big batch and tends to work out cheaper than buying tiny bags of food like reggie rat. Its also a lot better for your rat and no waste!

mardatha

Neighbour is asking this. Her son has 1 adult female rat in one cage. ! adult male rat in another cage, and now her son brought home 2 female babies in yet another cage.:D
She is asking if the babies can be moved in with the female, is that safe ?
She is about 14 months and the babies are 4 weeks. I'm used to ferrets and dono anythign about rats !

UKTigerlily

You can mix them if they are all definitely females & you introduce them slowly & properly, if you try to just put the young ones in with the older one it won't be pretty. Get them (or you can) to join the Fancy Rats forum & there's loads of advice there about integrating rats & you start iirc by putting the two cages side by side. Also, could the male be castrated & go in with the females as rats can't live alone & must have company of their own kind, so he'll either need a male friend or he'll need castrating & integrating also; done correctly there's no reason all four couldn't live together in time. The main thing is don't rush it & when they first meet it must be neutral territory (Such as in the bath)

Also, please get them to check the size of their cage on Fancy Rats, there's a cage calculator. Far too many have hamster sized cages, they need alot of room, I had six in a cage 5ft 4 tall & about 2.5 x 2.5ft square base!

mardatha

Ok many thanks, the cages I've seen and one is HUGE

petraandcedismum

I was wondering if anyone here owned rats?

We have a lot of rats and they are definitely my favourite pet.

petraandcedismum

Why is the boy alone?

Also, the 4 week old babies should still be with their mums at that age

I reccomend ratz tails forum this forum. I think you have to email support@ratztails.co.uk RE. joining, but it's mainly a Scottish forum.