He just turned 5 months and has been such an asshole these past couple weeks 😭 Currently separated from his brothers.

I’m a vet tech at the clinic and the dr is letting me assist! Bonus I get to keep them. Going to display them proudly

I left the room for 3 minutes to cut up a mango for myself (they been left alone for much longer before without any issues) and this little fcker some how manages to pull out my CD box from my tv stand (mind u that shit is HEAVY), get behind the plastic cover that I put there SO THIS WOULDN'T HAPPEN and then EAT THROUGH THE ENTIRE CABLE!

My entire room is rat proofed, or so I thought.

And no, I'm not accusing this little guy with no evidence, I know it was him because it's not any of my older boys (this i know for sure) which only leaves this little jolly fckur and his brother as the suspects.. And while his brother does love chewing on things, I know he wasn't guilty this time, because i left him on my bed when I went downstairs, and he was in the same spot chilling when I came back. Meanwhile Jeff, the criminal. Was sitting suspiciously close to the crime scene.. 🤔

(No rats were harmed, it was a cable with no electricity going through it, thankfully. And no cable was ingested, which I know because I found a whole bunch of cable pieces scattered behind the tv stand)

I was however harmed, because i had a fcking heart attack before I could confirm which cable it was, and before i got a hold of all the rats to check them all. Safe to say that they're grounded tomorrow until I worked out a solution.

My elderly rat has been on antibiotics for a few weeks for sneezing and puffiness. The vet noted possible neurological issues because he kept falling over, and suggested looking into palliative care (like steroids) after the antibiotics.

He was improving, but took a bad turn today:
- He became much more unresponsive than usual.
- He started chasing, biting his tail, and grooming excessively.
- About 10 minutes ago, he tensed up in a strange position while boggling and bruxing in an obviously uncomfortable way.
- He is now sleeping in an odd position.

I feel like he might pass away tonight. I'm willing to pay for medicine, but I don't want surgery or treatments that will just prolong his suffering, and my vets haven't been very helpful.

Should I take him into the vet tonight or just focus on making him comfortable at home? Any advice is appreciated.

a anyone got any good wheel links? or if anyones rats even use a wheel? im looking to getting back i to keeping some rats and my last boys refused their wheel. i wasnt sure if it was because it was to small or what. i couldnt tell you what size it was since this was a while ago.

Hey everyone! So I recently got 4 rats from someone rehoming them. I have 3 males and 1 female (spayed). This evening, I've found that one rat (Rupert) has ended up in a fight with my other two boys about half an hour apart. He had a fight with Spike, and Spike fought back but then ran away. Rupert was pretty fluffed up about it, so I waited for a bit and then took Spike out of the cage about 20 minutes later once it had calmed down

Then, as soon as I put Spike in the cage, Rupert tried to start on him again and Spike ran away. (They didn't really fight as he just ran away)

Anyways, I then hear a squeak and Rupert and Angel just had a fight. They ended up in a ball and Angel was squeaking a ton, and then they ended up on their back feet (Rupert fluffed up again), but then it calmed down

I feel like Rupert is the one starting on the others. They're 7-9 months old. Should I already start thinking about taking the ball privilege away from Rupert? Is there anything else I could do? Can I neuter him and not the other two? No other fights have happened but I don't want anything else to happen to please give some advice!

Hi all,

My rat has had chronic respiratory issues for his entire life, he was seen today and he has fluid in his heart which he was prescribed medicine for today, and took his first dose of not too long ago. He also takes prednisolone which I need to give him his dose of soon. The problem is he's really agitated. The vets ​gave him a sedative but I think it's wearing off. I just lost his brother yesterday and I am just really stressed out! ​​​​Does anyone have any advice on what to do? Any advice in general or just around how to give him the medicine is appreciated. He doesn't have an appetite. Do I just man-handle him and give him the meds as quick as I can? I'm worried if I do that, he'll get agitated again and have trouble breathing. I've been to two different vets today and they gave me the thumbs up to bring him home, but I'm just paranoid he's going to die a horrible death. ​​​​​I know that he shows no improvement on the medicines he's on, I'm going to euthanise him, but I'm hoping he'll pull through.

These girls have opened up so much in their space to run and play. They are more affectionate and outgoing all around and I love sitting with them (even though they're both little asshole toe biters).

Their free roam space is not in the rat room and I have experimented with having their cage in here vs not in here. It doesn't seem to make a difference to them at all. I do usually have either their carrier in or their temp cage, but they have no interest in either. What about your rats?

**Large dig box is going to be added to the free roam area as well as a small one to the cage**

(right after this he took off running with half the banana)

Roxie still allows Lily to clean her and is an absolute saint with just letting her do it- none of the other rats are as tolerant of her constant urge to groom everything and everyone, bless her little heart. She‘s allowed to groom my hand as much as she wants to of course (and she does want to.)

(baby rats are in a quarantine cage, their new cage is a lot bigger!)

my mom works at country max (she doesn’t like it at all, but a job is a job and we get our rats from actual breeders, not pet stores). i visited her at work yesterday and was allowed to stick my hand in the cage of the baby rats and say hi to them all. all the babies were so sweet, test nibbling and just overall cuties. while we were doing that, a lady came up needing 2 rats to feed her snakes. i didn’t think much of it, snakes gotta eat. my mom called me from her work today, the same lady came back. she talked to my mom about how in awe she was at her and me yesterday and saw rats from a totally new perspective and wanted to get some to keep as pets. my mom had an entire conversation with her about rats, showed her the best foods, cage setups and everything (recommending actual rat care not sold at country max.. shhh don’t tell her manager🤭🤭). it just made me so happy to see more and more people changing their perspective on rats, seeing them more as just snake food or gross critters. it wasn’t ideal to get rats from a pet store, but just to see someone taking steps to learn about rats as pets makes me feel so good🩵🩵

Hi,

I know what you're thinking. No I don't want to force my lifestyle choices on my boys.

The truth is I got my two boys a couple of months ago (brothers and there were only two left we are hoping to get more)

They are such adorable little critters and so social and intelligent.

My worry is theyre not gaining weight very quickly. Now as the title mentions I am pescetarian. This means we hardly ever have meat in the house unless we have guests over.

The boys do get eggs, safe fish, tofu etc for protein and I sometimes give them meat based baby food but I'm worried it's not enough.

The issue is any meat I do buy will be largely wasted bc of how little I would need for them and of course no one else in the house eating it.

Does anyone know any dog food brands that are safe for them to get meat maybe? Or have any solutions for how to get more protein into them?

Im absolutely fine having meat in the house and preparing meat - Im largely just vegetarian bc of some insensitivities I have to meat in terms of digesting it myself but I am happy to do whats right for my pets! I just want to minimise waste while doing it!

For reference I'm in the UK and in a VERY small town so it would need to be something I could get from a supermarket or maaaybe order online if theyll deliver to us.

that’s it. that’s the post.

I’m loving the starry theme and all the color but I still feel like the upper half is lacking - what do you think I could/should add?

Pardon the mess, I cleaned just a few days ago…you know how rats are!

Should I be concerned about this? Her tail does behave normally aswell but she seems to have a preference to curl it like a corkscrew.

I rehomed her 6-7 weeks ago and she’s around 6 months old so don’t know if she ran on wheels before coming to me,also she only seems to have started doing it within the last week or so. Seems fine otherwise but I haven’t noticed any of my other rats doing it before so it does seem abit odd to me

I’m preparing for my first rats and thought I’d got my cage sorted but I’ve just found I’d ordered the ferret nation instead of the critter nation by accident! Luckily it hadn’t dispatched yet so I’ve managed to cancel it — but now what?

The proper critter nation says it could arrive anywhere between the end of December (too long to wait is it is) and the 11th of March (insane!!), which seems suuuuper sketchy. Like amazon are trying to sell me something they don’t actually have access to.

Can’t find anything else with proper doors in stock anywhere! Ideally I want the storage shelf too bc I want to do a dropped base.

I’m based in east anglia and don’t drive so I need something shipped. HELP.

Early today I decided to euthanise one of my extremely loved rats after two different vets gently urged me to. I had to decide between euthanasia or surgery (which the vets were very uncertain about the outcome and my rat had a small chance of a traumatic development causing him to die in the wait for the surgery)

This rat was only 10 months old. I feel so bad because I know that there's a chance that the surgery may have worked. Im worried that Santi (this rat) will resent me and be confused when he realises that I decided to euthanise him. I just didn't want him to experience any more suffering. I don't know how to cope and i feel guilty.

Does anyone have any experience/advice on coping after euthanasing a heart rat?

My heart Rat, Kiwi passed away peacefully in her sleep today.

She was the sweetest little soul. I’ll miss her terribly. 🩶🤍

I just wanted to share my favourite photos of her.