My new lil Momma!

[MeMe]

Thanks Jo...but when can or should I change her bedding?

I don't wanna disturb her nest.

The first step to recovery is admitting you have a problem

Hi my name is Meme and I am addicted to snakes/rats/tattoos and....

ROCKSTAR!!!

[frankykeno]

I usually leave moms and new babies be for a few days before any major cage cleaning (hers looks lovely and clean from your pics). I might reach in and quickly grab any blood tinged bedding and I do usually check the pinks within 24 hours to make sure everyone has a milkband and no one is genetically unfit. When I do that I simply tuck momma rat into a handy container, have a quick tidy of the cage, check the babies and pop them right back into her nest area without disturbing the nest much at all. Back momma rat goes in, she'll mess about checking her babies then settle back in usually.

When you are doing a regular full cage change out, just pop mom and babies into secure containers, change out the tub, pop the babies back in first into one corner and then momma. I usually put the litter seperate from her so I can use cage cleaning day as a time to once again have a quick hands on check of her growing offspring. Once they are all back in their now clean home, she'll busy herself sorting out where she'd like to place her litter.

[Laooda]

Congrats!!!! Great litter too! Those little wigglers will steal your heart! Be careful!

[MeMe]

thanks Jo and Laura!!!

I went in and checked on her and she is happily nursing away!

My lil Girl Cait was so excited about them!

She is 8 and has said many times that she wants to be a vet when she grows up.

what a cool learning experience for her!

[frankykeno]

You know I was really worried about our youngest son and helping him understand about some of the rats being feeders (he was 5 at the time). Amazingly after we explained it simply to him, talked a bit about predators/prey and how we eat meat just in another way....he accepted it without a fuss. He now is involved in all aspects from rat colony care to feeding his own snake. He'll point out rats in the colony and say..."those stay, they have names"...."those are food, they don't have names". Occasionally he will want to keep a few and we have to remind him that if we kept all the rats born, the snakes would starve and also we'd run out of room so no more ratties could get born. He sees this simple logic.

[MeMe]

yea Cait asked me this morning if I was keeping them.

I told her we would have to see what we may keep but that I had them to feed the snakes.

She is pretty ok with it.

She would not be so ok with it if it were bunnies!

She has been wanting one forever now...we are looking at some dwarf bunnies for her now. for her b-day

That's one of the reasons we stopped feeding Prince the bunnies! :eek: lol

she would get a lil tear in her eye everytime!

[ZEKESMOM]

Congrats on all those lovely babies

[frankykeno]

When we were fostering the big boa who did eat small bunnies we would stop at the bunny breeder, he knew we were coming so one of the right size was waiting to be discretely tucked in the back of the car. When we got home, one of us distracted Mikey, the other parent snuck the feeder bunny into the back room. After Mikey went to bed that night, the boa ate. Worked really well and Mikey was never the wiser about that snake's dinner habits.

Jo & Mike - Black Ops Bunny Operations our specialty!

[frankykeno]

MeMe if we are going to gab rats in PM, "someone" needs to clean out her PM box so "someone" can get incoming messages LOL.

[Jahbeard]

WooHoo!! Go Rattie, its your birthday!

Tonight we're gonna party like it's 1399. (bad century for rats)