Special treat for pet rats

Becky (or anyone else out there that has rats for pets not just as a feeder) ever heard of this trick for keeping adult rats coats in perfect condition (really soft). I read it online and have been trying it with my 3 pet rats. I take one slice of bread (usually the end piece of wheat bread) and pour a light coating of extra virgin olive oil (veggie oil would probably do but with an Italian hubby we usually only have e.v.o.o. in the house), then I just pull it into bite size piece and share one slice amongst all three of them, hand feeding as special treat. Started it about 3 weeks ago (they get it twice a week) and the difference in the coats, especially my oldest adult male Cracker, is just amazing! Their fur feels as soft as when they were babies and it's not affecting their poop or anything. They sure love it too!

Does anyone think it's kinda wierd to really like snakes that eat rats but also have great pet rats that we love. We get a lot of comments from friends and family about how could we get a snake and feed it f/t rats when we play with Cracker, Rocky and Cookie every day? Funny but we just don't see a problem with that really.

We don't see a problem with it either. My kids and I have all had *just* pet rats in the past, and we have 5 breeder rats now who are basically treated as pets. Ours really like soy snacks and peanuts for treats, oh and cheese cookies too. We'll have to try the EVOO and bread idea, thanks for the tip!

We have pet rats too! We play with them and handle them alot. I get weird looks to from ppl who see that we have rats as pets, yet we feed rats off to our snakes. I kinda chuckle at thier astonishment. You're not alone! ;)

Oh yeah, that olive oil does wonders for their skin. You can give them sardines also, and even though it makes the room stinky for a little bit, it really makes a difference.

Marla, I add a whole bag of unshelled roasted peanuts(the ones you find at WalMart) to their food mix. Sneezy picks those out first and hoards them.

All of my girls and Sneezy, even the hairless girls, are very soft, and they don't have flaky skin. The dog food they get is the Purina Beneful Salmon and Rice. They LOVE it. Plus, it gives them those omega fatty acids and makes them healthier. I give them yogurt, frozen veggies and fruit, chocolate chips, marshmallows, dog biscuits, pig ear chewies, cow hooves, pretty much anything I can think of that they would like. I found a great fruit mix at WalMart. It was 4.88(I think) and has cranberries, golden raisins, peanuts, cashews, chocolate chips, peanut butter chips and white chocolate chips. I just give them a handful every so often and they just go nuts. The chocolate is good for them, boosts their immune systems, but don't give too often.

Pretty much anything we have, they can have, with the exception of citrus fruits and a few other things. I'll try to find the list of things they can't have.

We get a lotta strange looks and comments too. We talked with our 4 kids and they know if we breed our pet rats that's for pets....food is food...whether we eat it or a pet does everything eats something....our kid's are pretty cool with that and all of them love snakes so that helps (our oldest prefers corns tho). They just needed reassured that their rats or their rat's babies weren't meant for snake snacks.

Guarantee your rats will love the oil/bread thing and you won't believe how their coats will be after a couple of weeks. All our rats eat a homemade food I make up in a big bucket and that has soy nuts in it (or whatever I find interesting in the bulk bin isle that month LOL)...they LOVE it (much better for them and cheaper in the long run since they tend to eat most all of it rather than just pick out a few things like they did on commercial mixes).

Got a great hint the other day....buy a single brick from any Home Depot or Lowe's...under a buck usually...put it where they go to eat so they must climb up on it daily to get a snack....keeps there nails down beautifully but doesn't cause damage as they are off and on it so quickly. Easy to clean with a harsh brush tho my rats usually don't poop near their food source anyways.

If I ever get around to buying a digital camera I'll have to post a picture of Cracker aka Fattus Rattus.

~~Joanna~~

I'd love to see pictures of them :) All of mine are pretty fat, except for Harry and Emily. I think the hairless are just naturally lean.

Just know that if you breed those rats for pets, you may end up with 20 babies that need homes, or will end up in the freezer for the snake. Raising them for pets is alot harder than raising them for feeders. You have to handle every single one multiple times per day, and make sure they are social. My girl, Lloyd, only had 8 babies(her only litter) and they were ALOT of work. Especially if it's the mom's frist time, there are a bunch of things that can go wrong. She can hemorrhage, not lactate appropriately, not have a good mothering instinct, etc. I'm not trying to scare you out of breeding them, but just so you know that there are so many of them in shelters, rescues and in foster care that need homes, it's just kind of pointless to add to the population, unless they are for a specific purpose(ie: being fed to the snake). If you have homes already arranged, then awesome!:) But if it is only for the purpose of your kids getting to witness the act of birth, then I don't believe it is very appropriate. Again, I'm not trying to be rude, but you wouldn't believe how many people breed their dogs and cats just so their kids can see that, and then wonder what to do with all of the puppies and the mom when they don't want them anymore.

And yeah, I get alot of strange questions since I have rats and a snake, living in the same bedroom :) I keep a flat rock in the girl's cage and that helps a little, but once a week, I trim everyone's nails. All 7 of them. Takes about 15-20 minutes if they don't wiggle too much, LoL. Rats... Wiggle...? Nah. Sneezy's cage doesn't have room for a big rock and he would just make a mess all over it anyway. Little poop monster, LoL

Oh yeah, here's a pic of fatboy Elliott. He's living in San Francisco, but hopefully I'll get to see him again. I wish I could have kept him.

http://img201.echo.cx/img201/4365/elliot7vd.th.jpg

http://img201.echo.cx/img201/7766/elliot23eh.th.jpg

We talked to him about going to Curves, Weight Watchers or Jenny Craig, but he kept denying his problem. Not that him being fat was a problem, he was absolutely adorable. And mushy, and marshmallowy, and squishy. All that a fat boy should be. You could roll him over on his back in your hands and he would just look at you, like "Woman, I swear, if I weren't so fat, I would roll over and right myself." He was so sweet and kissy. I miss him...

This is one link I have for forbidden foods.

http://www.petratscanada.com/forbidden_foods.htm

We are actually only planning one mating for our berkshire blaze female Cookie to our handsome, studly, wonderfully sweet natured (hey he's on my shoulder and who knows if he can read LOL) male rat Cracker. Cookie has the most amazing dark chocolate and white coat and a perfect blaze. Cracker is a bareback...white/dark blonde. Both have perfect personalities. We are keeping one of the best girls as a companion to mom but will not breed Cookie until we know we have homes for her babies. Shouldn't be too hard as a lot of people we know never would have considered a pet rat till they met Mr. Fattus Rattus but I understand your point about too many animals ending up unwanted and it's always good to promote careful breeding of any animal.

Thanks for the idea of the pigs ears. I'm always looking for more ideas to help the lil furry wonders keep those ever growing teeth to a nice length.

Quick question tho....do any of you notice that female rats are just such busy bodies. The boys are happy no matter how I arrange their cage (I change it around to give them new places to explore and such). They check out any new additions then happily eat and go curl up for a nap together. My female checks everything out, re-arranges it all to HER satisfaction before she'll even take a bite to eat LOL. We crack up laffing at her efforts, lugging this or that around her cage, digging and moving her bedding and so forth. I know females tend to be more active than males but she's too funny!

~~Joanna~~

I'm glad you understood where I was coming from. Just make sure you adopt them out in same sex pairs, don't want anyone being lonely :)

That's the link I was looking for. I knew it was somewhere.

Yes! My girls are NUTS! They are everywhere, all the time, go! go! go! Except for the 5 minutes that they sleep, and then they are off again. Crazy girlies. Just wondering, what type of bedding do you use? I finally got a chance to use the Sani-Chips Aspen from Harlan Teklad, and it's working out wonderfully. It's so soft and feels like confetti when I sift through it. Very absorbent too. If you ever get a chance to order from there, a bag is only $7.95, and worth a try. Their lab blocks are great too.

Maybe we should post pictures of cages too. I like seeing what others use. Soon, I plan on building a cabinet cage(with the help of my rat breeder friend, Chrissy). It should be an adventure :)

Yep will adopt them out that way. I hate Cookie living alone till she's big enough for her first litter but I do so want a daughter of her and Cracker's mating (dying to see how the genetics will work between them) so we just give her tons of extra attention to make up for it.

I use fine shavings bedding we get from a local small mill here (no cedar of course) the guy there is happy to sell it to me for $5.00 for two huge bags, plus Cookie gets strips of newspaper as she won't be happy till her sleeping box is stuffed to the rafters with it (nesting instinct I guess). Cookie's in a nice big cage the boys outgrew so it does one rat fine for now. Kracker and Rocky (I keep misspelling that LOL and my kids named them after Uncle Kracker and Kid Rock....Cookie is for her color like an oreo cookie) live in a 30 gallon tall ocotogon aquarium. They all have natural branches to climb on (we gathered a bunch of hard wood branches and Mike stripped them down and cleaned them so no buggies came in).

Years ago when I had rats the first time we built a really cool home with two levels joined by a maze. I'm hoping to do that again this summer - one for the boys, one for the girls. We were talking to a guy at our local pet store and he had run pipes (those big ones for plumbing I think) thru his walls so his pet rats could run from room to room, cage to cage...now that is a rat lover LOL!

I can see I have to buy a darn digital camera, another item to add to my growing list (hmmm Mike is working an overtime shift tomorrow LOL).

Just so the shavings aren't green(not dry-still alive) or aren't pine, then I say that's an awesome deal. If it is pine, then you may be setting youself up for some serious respiratory issues on down the road. The phenols in pine can be very rough on their lungs. Is it dusty? I'm sorry, I just don't want your rats to have continuous myco flare-ups from being exposed to pine. I know my wallet hates vet bills just as much as the next person.

I would have loved to see that cage. Tunnels all around the room sounds awesome. Probably heck to clean though. Eeew, boy rat piddle. Speaking of pee, tanks are ok to use(we used 10 gallons for when Harry and Lloyd each had babies, and to house them in-we used a 30gallon), but I'd be wary using them for boy rats. They seem to have alot more ammonia in their pee, and it can really build up. Sorry! It's the vet tech in me, I can't help it! :-D

I haven't found any branches outside that I want to use... Not to mention my oven isn't big enough to bake them in, but anyway. I'd probably end up finding the "perfect" branch, but it would still be attached to the tree... Meaning I would have to "ACTUALLY" exert some energy and cut it down. Jeez, all for rats. The things we go through for them. :)

What I found that they really love is shop towels. I found a pack of 75 of them at Sam's Club for $10. I even made hammocks out of them so in case they decided to shred them, oh well. OK, I'm done rambling.

We live in the forest so branch supply is endless. Actually we have a huge supply of last years cut, so the branches are hard as rocks and dry. Great for the rats to climb around on. Yep that's my problem with the acquarium for the boys, I worry about air exchange tho it has a screened top. The bedding isn't very dusty tho I'm going to check out that bedding you are trying.



Thought you might enjoy this link. Some great ideas for homemade rat cages either built from scratch or by using a cabinet and rehabing it.



http://www.dapper.com.au/cages.htm

Oh forgot to ask, has anyone heard of giving a rat a live feeder goldfish in a low water dish to hunt and eat? I have read it on a couple of websites and think my girl rat would love this (I'll put money on it my two boys will laze around and wonder where the sardines are lol)

YES! I have been wanting to try that. It looks absolutely hilarious. My friend Chrissy, the rat breeder here in Texas, does that with all of her rats and says they love fishing around in the water and getting them. She does it with frozen peas too, let's them fish it out. I need to find a heavy bowl that I can put water in and then go buy a few feeder fish. I think they would have a blast.

Yep I'm going to save the frozen peas fishing idea for summer as our house doesn't have central air and can get a bit warmish on the exposed side of the house (the other side is always shaded by the heavy forest growth). Nice cool treat for the hot Michigan summers.

I'm going to try that idea of the goldfish. I figure the rats will enjoy it and it's got to be a good diet change for them, just don't know if they'll like the lil fishing hats and vests they'll have to wear LMBO!

My female Cookie should love it as she seems fascinated with playing in water. She has a plastic bowl with clean river rocks in it and fresh water daily to muck in. Makes for more work daily cleaning of her cage but it keeps her from going nutsy trying to chew holes in water bottles (even ones in metal tubes) to get to the water. I think that rat is part raccoon.

I am going to have to try that goldfish idea! As well as get some branches from outside. What temp do you bake them at to get rid of mites and bugs?

I just do 300 degrees until everything is completely dry. Nothing has blown up yet ;)

Cool. I have so much wood to pick through out in the back. I could make a wicked cool setup for my boa if I did that! I was always terrified of bringing in woodlice or other fun little things, bu now I don't have to be! Unless they take up residence in the oven and end up in my next Tuna Casserole!
:edit: I never have actually made tuna casserole; I am more likely to whip up some rice a roni, but it sounded good in theory.

Just because I'm anal retentive and paranoid, I soak everything in bleach water, and then bake 'em for pretty much the whole day. If the branch is too big to fit in the oven, you can just lay it on a towel outside on the concrete or something during a nice, hot day. Just make sure you don't lay it around any ants :)

Yeah, I would be paranoid about bringing yucky bugs into our house too. But the basement is dirt floor and pretty much open to the elements, so who knows what is living in these walls? lol. We had a toad hopping around our dining room last summer. And add to this, I am a neat freak when it comes to house cleaning. Scary!