The other night I lost a very important pet to me. He was my blue hooded male rat that was only a little over 2 years old. Rocco underwent a respiratory infection that I didn't think anything of. I could have completely prevented this from continuing, but unfortunately I cannot spot out rat illnesses like I can with snakes.
He wasn't just any rat. Nothing like the ones I've fed to my snakes thousands of times. He had an amazing personality. Whenever I went up to his enclosure, the female was always excited looking for food to pass through the bars of the cage. But not him, he would get really excited looking forward to coming out and showing me affection. He would jump up in my lap and give me kisses all over my arm. His favorite thing and only thing he wanted to do was to lay in my lap and get scratchies all over his body for as long as I could.
Rocco truly showed me how rats REALLY can be. They are extremely intelligent and affectionate animals. Before Rocco, I used to care after 28 different rat groups of 1.3 every Saturday at the reptile sanctuary. This was how I started to fall in love with rats, but it still did not show me their individual personalities. I purchased Rocco through Petsmart to be one of my breeding males, but I didn't actually start to breed until a year later. When his little girlfriend finally had her first litter I actually felt something, something sad, before having to feed off the babies to my snakes. I've never had that feeling or hold back when dealing with rodents, but after seeing how loving rats can actually be I will always have that feeling although I have done it emotionless for 6 years.
Here are some photos... This is Rocco just a week or two ago.
http://i609.photobucket.com/albums/t...ary2012031.jpg
Him and his black hooded girlfriend
http://i609.photobucket.com/albums/t...ary2012032.jpg
This was taken a couple weeks ago or so. They were the best little family. Always cuddled, kissed, and cleaned each other. He would even sleep with his pups if the female wasn't there sleeping with them. This photo probably upsets me the most, this is a cute memory.
http://i609.photobucket.com/albums/t...ary2012033.jpg
One of Rocco's blue hooded pups. A female. Very adorable, and hoping for more in 4 weeks if he got the job done before his passing.
http://i609.photobucket.com/albums/t...ary2012030.jpg
Thanks for reading.
