Rat Cages?

Thanks, Becky!


Yeah, cleaning the bucks' cages can be the pits with the piddle puddles, but the one cage that has a solid shelf, I clean it 1-2x a week. Otherwise, everything is cleaned and changed 7-10 days.

It's time to upgrade, so I'll be looking at the Martins again. :)

I had two Martins cages years back for my rats, when I had twenty something Hairless, and they were the best by far. I even cut an opening in the side and connected two cages with pvc pipe, so my kids could go back and forth from cage to cage!

People will always seem to debate the wire/plastic bottoms, however I've found that it's really up to the specific rat which is better.

When I had my two girls I had a very large multi level with wire bottoms and a hammock at the top level, it was great because puddles didn't occur at all and as long as each level was thoroughly soaked in hot water and dried completely once every three weeks (combined with spot cleaning every three days or so) all were fine. I'd also spread out a bit of bedding on each layer to give them a spot to lay about. I had found that with plastic bottoms inside they would chew the plastic instead of chewing on their chew blocks, but they were both notorious chewers anyway.

My third Rat however had trouble with the mesh. I got her as a baby and her feet were too small to negotiate the mesh bottoms and I ended up housing her separately in a single level cage with a couple plastic platforms as the larger females liked to pick on her... She never once chewed anything but her chew blocks, so she would have been fine with the plastic, and I found that she didn't like to relieve herself on anything but the bedding, so as long as the plastic was kept bedding free it was a breeze to keep clean.

I was gonna buy a martins cage... then I decided I cant afford it, in money or space. But I will DEF get one when I can. lol

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Argentra

Ah, now I know how to post pics! Here is my rat cage:

https://ball-pythons.net/gallery/fil...atcagepost.JPG

And yes, those are my girls in the top left corner. Tho you can barely see them cause of the reflection.

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Wow that's an amazing enclosure for them. They must have a blast with all those toys to mess about with and all those levels to explore. Rat heaven!

:D Thanks. They certainly do enjoy it...well, Amber does. We lost Mint (the silver hooded) last sunday. But I'm getting two new little ones Monday from the same breeder Amber came from. One of them is even a manx, so this should be fun.
I love to build and refurbish things, so adding the wire to that cage was kinda fun, if you don't count all the times I got scratched by the ends before I filed them down. :)

Oh so sorry to hear about your other pet rat passing on. I'll bet Amber will be happy to get some new buddies in there with her. Rats just don't do all that well without others around to cuddle with, groom, have a good boxing session, that sort of thing.

Thanks for the condolences.

I'm pretty sure that once the quarantine is over, Amber will take to the two little ones pretty quick (BTW they're 2 months old right now, so nice and young). She's just the cuddliest rat you ever saw. :) Right now, I hold and pet her at least once every day to try and keep her from getting too lonely. Seems to be working, but it's hard to tell with an animal that sleeps most of the day and comes out after you're asleep :)

So, anyone have any recommendations on things to do to keep a lone rat from getting depressed until the new ones can be added?

Just extra attention and treats of course (rats being so food driven that love = food for most of the scroungers LOL). I'm sure she'll happily mother the new younger females and they'll all settle in together quite nicely. :)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Argentra

Ah, now I know how to post pics! Here is my rat cage:

https://ball-pythons.net/gallery/fil...atcagepost.JPG

And yes, those are my girls in the top left corner. Tho you can barely see them cause of the reflection.

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as for this enclosure.. is the bottom bars/wire? im thinking of buying something very similar and was told it had a bottom with wire so the feces could fall through, was wondering what to do in this situation, they are really little babys for now so we would keep it till they got a bit bigger (maybe put them in it now if i could think of a proper bottom) what are your thoughts?