Anyone feel like double checking my solution to smell?

So my fiance and I rent out two rooms in a house where two girls and another guy also live. I THOUGHT that having them in an entirely seperate room away from the rest of the house would make smell a non issue if I was diligant about substrate changes. WELL I didnt acount for the ladies monthly demonic posession. Theyre like fricking bloodhounds, and god knows they managed to syncronize and give me twice as much BS for it. Apparently despite it being on the top floor with the door always closed, they can smell it when theyre open the kitchen door a floor down, and the basement two floors down. Granted I share the floor with one of them, so I understand that a little more, but I swear the other room mate must have super senses to smell that from all the way down there. I dont smell it until im right outside the door. /rant

Anyway, so they ganged up on me the other night and told me I had to do something about it. It wasnt a threat, I may not be on the lease but I am renting half of the rooms in the house, so they cant really give me an ultimatum. But in the hope of keeping things peaceful I started brainstorming. I have an old fan(the kind you close your window on to make an airtight seal, that can either blow air in or blow air out). So I used trash bags and duct tape to make airtight seals on the two vents in the room(that my room mate beleives sends the rat smell straight to the kitchen), and I set the window fan to exaust so its pulling air out of the room. I thoroughly febreezed a blanket and placed in in front of the space under the door, and set a glade plug in opposite corner of the rat cages so it wont be too intense for them.

That should be fine while its warm I THINK. But its gonna be fall soon. I think when the cold whether comes I may just have to close the window, and set up a space heater(as the vents will still be blocked stopping the room from being heated) and hope I can manage good temps = /

Do you guys think it will work? Between the snakes and my ferrets(who im actively trying to switch to an all raw rat diet) Breeding rats saves me a TON of money. Not to mention I love doing it. So I really kind of need to make it work. I may move when the lease is up in june, but its not an option at the present. Please guys, pick my plan apart and hopefully improve upon it. I could really use the opinions. Im not even sure if im confident this will work XD

The only thing I can think of to offer, but may be overkill, would be setting up a ventilation system similar to what people use when they're growing marijuana indoors. I don't know too much about it, but if you're running out of options it may be something worth looking into.

What kind of substrate are you using for them? I use pine pellets and pine shavings and clean the tubs twice a week. I live in a one bedroom and have 0 smell issues.


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oh man, I can't imagine rats and ferrets in the same house. A friend of mine had ferrets and cleaned them religiously. Her house still always smelled. Febreeze only does so much lol!

How often do you clean the cages? I've found that good ventilation is key.

A guy I know that breeds in a closed space has no smell. He keeps the rats in one of those plastic outdoor sheds you can buy and at the top of the shed he has some weird reverse air pressure system that sucks all of the smell out but doesn't let the cold from outdoors get in.
Maybe someone can explain in better detail.

I have an idea for you.

Step one: Aquire ONA liquid concentrate: http://www.amazon.com/ONA-Liquid-Con...ywords=ona+gel

Step two: Go to the home depot and pick up the following...
http://www.homedepot.com/h_d1/N-5yc1...&storeId=10051
http://www.homedepot.com/h_d1/N-5yc1...1#.UE4rC6RAZgo
http://www.homedepot.com/Appliances/...&storeId=10051

Step three: Assemble the deodorizer. Drill some holes in the bucket about 2/3 of the way up. This will act as an air intake. Remove the stand from the fan so its just the round fan. It should fit perfectly on top of the bucket.
Pour the crystals in the bucket and fill it with water. Use less water at first because the crystals will expand. You want the bucket to be filled about halfway with crystals.
Pour in a few splashes of the ONA and put your fan on top (facing up). Plug it in and you are good to go!

Any questions?

I would say invest in a cheap outdoor shed

I don't know about the ferrets, but if rats are cleaned frequently enough there shouldn't be an odor from them.

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Rats can stink the day after you clean, so that's not the answer...

^^^up there said it, use a 4inch inline fan with a charcoal sock/filter on it, odor gone.

I also know an easy DIY for a carbon filter, but it required a pretty intense fan for it to work efficiently. The fans can get pretty loud.

Go to the DIY section and find the tutorial for the box fan hepa filter. If you get the high rated filter it REALLY does help. I had two 3 bin racks (6 total bins) inside in a 1 bedroom apt during the winter time and it really cut down smell. I still had to change bedding twice a week though.

Also, if you could point a fan out an open window, that would help some too.

Ventilation is EVERYTHING. Stagnant air just builds up. A fan alone makes a huge difference. I would suggest investing in an air purifier. I bought a decent one off Amazon for $50. It works great!
To keep the actual rat odor down, you can put a few drops of vanilla extract into their water. (Don't do this with ferrets.)
Nothing really beats weekly cleaning. I have to change bedding at least once a week minimum. But the usual average is twice a week. Also makes a difference on how many animals you have in a single enclosure.
Baking Soda under the rat bedding and ferret litter makes a small difference too.
But all in all, keep the air flow going. It makes the biggest difference out of all the other options.

And is it possible that your housemates are smelling other things? If you can't smell the rats until you're in front of the rat room door and they can smell it on the other side of the house, that doesn't add up.

Maybe just put some scented wall plug ins around the housemate's rooms.....

What kind of for your rats? A good quality food will make them smell better than rats on bad quality food. I've found that aspen and newspaper pellet litter works best for bedding. I've tried quite a few products and they don't keep the smell down as much.

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Originally Posted by darthsamurai

oh man, I can't imagine rats and ferrets in the same house. A friend of mine had ferrets and cleaned them religiously. Her house still always smelled. Febreeze only does so much lol!

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I have rats, snakes, and ferrets in the same room.

My ferrets have their ferrety odor, but they don't smell bad. It's their cage and bedding that really smells if I don't wash it weekly. Not to mention their litter box. As long as their bedding and litter is clean, there is little odor.
And bathing ferrets actually makes the smell worse, so tell your friend to not bath your ferrets. Like snakes, bathing a ferret washes away natural oils. The oil production goes into overdrive once they're washed away and will actually produce more, thus smelling more. Ferrets are self groomers like cats, so it's really no need to wash them unless they step in poop or something.

I have two ferrets on raw and they don't have that ferrety smell anymore. They stunk when I first got them, but soon after switching to raw it went away. They still have 'a smell', but all you need to do is rub a little baking soda into their fur. As for the rats, I have over ten adults and all the young. I keep the all the rats, two male guinea pigs and a bird in a bedroom that also doubles as my living/entertainment area (I have my tv and ps3 there). There is very little odor in there, the strongest odor I get when I open the door in the morning (I keep the door closed to keep the cats out at night) is pine and hay. For my rats I use a layer of pine pellets with pine shaving on top. The pellets do a wonderful job of adsorbing the urine and cutting the smell. Since doing it this way I don't have to clean my cages as often. Before I would clean the rats ever 4 or 5 days. Now I clean once a week or so, as needed. My cage with two pet males only needs cleaning once every ten days. If the cage/tub has a lot of young I will add more pellets and put some baking soda mixed in too.

Thanks for all the responses guys! I'll look into building a DIY deoderizer.

My rats are currently on aspen substrate, which I generally change once a week. Starting this week, Ill be changing twice a week though. Theyre being fed Alpo dog food. I have a 35 gallon w/ 1.5, and two 10 gallons with 1.2, currently have 2 litters.
---------(I incorrectly thought that I could only keep breeders for 3 litters, and meant to feed off the ones I retired to my burm. Consequently, no rats would live long enough to see negative health effects from being fed said dog food. I am aware that the dyes MAY build up in the snakes system as well. Upon learning I can keep one set of breeders for a year or two, ive decided to simply breed on a larger scale and keep more grow outs for the burm. Because they will be living longer, I intend to switch to lab block, which If im remembering correctly will also greatly help with odor and coat quality)-------------

Now, my room mates(the guy included) are sorority girls. Two faced, backstabbing, best friend to you to your face then break your leg when you turn around manipulative people who would rather lose a finger than admit fault in anything, but crucify another the moment they are inconvenienced by that person. They dont like to smell unpleasant things. Ever. So it is entirely plausible that they are simply complaining because they dont like that I have rats and ferrets, cant ask me to get rid of them because I would sooner move out, and cant ask me to move out because they need me to rent out these two rooms.(Past room mate who was in their sorority spread word to everyone they collectively knew about how terrible they were and as a result they have been unable to find new room mates.)

They really might not smell anything at all. Or maybe just be getting a whiff and dramatizing it. Or they might be pathological to the point where they truly beleive they are smelling something they arent smelling because they think they are going to smell it. They partake in a lot of substances. I wouldnt at all be suprised by any of it.

Personally at very worst, like if I havent changed it in two weeks, I can smell it on the way down the stairs. never on the floor below. And I have a pretty good nose. My fiances agrees with me, and his profession is based around his nose and tongue(Chef). Id be amazed if they truly were nauseous from the smell two floors down. But what can I do, other than make a new airflow system, sink money into a deoderizer, and talk them off the ledge? @_@

I keep mines on pine pellets and pine shavings. Also add a few drops of real vanilla extract to there water(that good stuff) in about 4 to 5 times you won't have a smell at all

The Alpo is a HUGE part of your problem! If you get them on rat block, you will notice a difference in smell and the way your rats look.

I was rat sitting for a friend and her rats and their enclosures STUNK! She was feeding them Publix brand dog food. The smell didn't go away when I changed bedding, the rats were greasy and gross. Comparing them side by side to my rats who get Mazuri, the difference was staggering.

They will eat and waste less of the high quality food and in turn save you money. Believe me.

Heres hoping. Right now im paying 18 dollars for 3 months of food. I dont know how long a 50lb bag of mazuri 6F will last me, but its $38 with shipping, so dear god I hope it lasts a while XDD

If you can find a feed store that carries Purina, they can get in the Mazuri for you. I pay 24$ a bag. I have a 6 bin rack with 1.4 plus babies and it lasts me about a month. It's totally worth the extra to not get kicked out of your apartment. I promise you will notice a difference in smell and look of your rats.

Haha. I wont be getting kicked out. The only reason im renting the second room is because they couldnt find anyone even interested in looking at it in 8 months time. Rats wont be what gets me out of the house, but im going to try and make it better regardless. Frankly im not even sure I HAVE a local feed store. Im right about on the cusp of the city, and I tried googling to find one, but didnt see anything closeby. I could maybe try petsmart? since they absolutely carry purina, but I feel like they would just direct me to the website where I could find mazuri products.

Try privately owned pet stores too. I have Mazuri and it makes a huge difference in body condition. The rats are less greasy and don't smell as much as dog food fed rats.

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My rats are in my basement and you can't tell they are there however takes a few things to make that happen.

First I use pin pellet in combination with shaving (very absorbent)

Second I have an exhaust fan running 24/7 - This one http://www.northerntool.com/shop/too...4853_200444853

Those in addition to regular cleaning and no overcrowding and it can be done.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Deborah

My rats are in my basement and you can't tell they are there however takes a few things to make that happen.

First I use pin pellet in combination with shaving (very absorbent)

Second I have an exhaust fan running 24/7 - This one http://www.northerntool.com/shop/too...4853_200444853

Those in addition to regular cleaning and no overcrowding and it can be done.

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I cannot stress enough, and completely agree with Deb, no overcrowding! You could have a good number of rodents in an area and never smell a thing if they are not all jammed together.

The smell decreased a lot when I switched my rats to lab blocks from dog food. I am feeding native earth/harlan. The rats also prefer it over dog food and are so much healthier.