Today was a very ratty day
Okay so, I'm keeping the rat. Yeesh. :) I guess I kinda figured. I got him a friend yesterday and I spent today shopping for a permanent cage, a few accessories, and the ingredients for the homemade "Suebee's Rat Diet" that's supposed to be so good. Oh and lab blocks. I had to go to the feed store for those.
Here is the cage. It's the biggest cage I could get with closely-spaced bars (most decently-sized cages available outside of internet orders are really for chinchillas and ferrets, etc, and the bars are too widely-spaced for rats). It's 36x30x14, I believe, has 3 floors and two doors. I still need to find them some better hides but they're settled for now. I think I've decided to call them Jake and Elwood, because I can. :) Jake being the feeder rat.
I haven't got any shots of Elwood yet, but here's Jake:
I got kind of irritated at the pet store people yesterday when I went to pick out another rat. I am well aware that there may be some dominance fighting among newly-intruduced males, and YES it is possible they MAY refuse to accept one another. But I wasn't too happy with being told flat-out that they would fight to the death if I put them together, no matter what. 8| I told them I'd "be careful, and can I see one please?" Ugh. :P
Anyways all the large ratties they had were the same coloring as Jake, which was a little annoying, I did want to be able to tell them apart quickly. Then I spotted one that was white with a black hood, but with a cute little white star on his forehead, so I asked to see him. While I was petting him a lady and her two friends wandered by and went ga-ga and soon both myself and the lady were petting the rat. He was all about being petted. He fluffed up and looked around and kinda smacked his lips and washed his face and then he shoved his head between my fingers like "pet harder, dammit!" So I bought him. :)
I didn't just *throw* them together. I put them together in my 10-gallon with Jake's (inherited from my late newt) cave while I cleaned out the 20-L and set it up for two rats (temporarily, of course). They were getting along fine so I put them into the 20-L. No, no quarantine period. No week of supervised playtimes together to make sure they wouldn't fight. Maybe I'm a horrible ratmom but considering that this all started because Duchess wouldn't eat, I wasn't going to go through loads of trouble.
Well, Elwood decided, I guess, that he was The Boss, and he started sitting on top of the cave and attacking Jake whenever the latter tried to come out for something to eat or drink. As there was no blood, and Elwood was just kinda...forcing Jake onto his back and sitting on him until Jake gave up and went back into the cave, I didn't think it was too pressing a deal. I went to bed. But before I left to go shopping the next day I took Jake and his cave and set him up with food and water in the 10 gallon just so I'd be sure he was getting to eat and drink. Elwood seemed really depressed that I took Jake away and just huddled in the back corner of the tank behind the wheel, and apparently stayed there all day.
Well after I set up the new cage (and I haven't the heart to take Jake's cave from him so it's in there, on the bottom floor) they both ran around (Jake tends to want to hover near the cave though, he never left the bottom floor) and got along fine and finally both crammed themselves into the cave and went to sleep. So I really think they're fine.
I'm tired.
(Okay I just caught them fighting, but I know some scuffling is normal, and there still isn't any blood. They're just being boy rats.)
Here is the cage. It's the biggest cage I could get with closely-spaced bars (most decently-sized cages available outside of internet orders are really for chinchillas and ferrets, etc, and the bars are too widely-spaced for rats). It's 36x30x14, I believe, has 3 floors and two doors. I still need to find them some better hides but they're settled for now. I think I've decided to call them Jake and Elwood, because I can. :) Jake being the feeder rat.
I haven't got any shots of Elwood yet, but here's Jake:
I got kind of irritated at the pet store people yesterday when I went to pick out another rat. I am well aware that there may be some dominance fighting among newly-intruduced males, and YES it is possible they MAY refuse to accept one another. But I wasn't too happy with being told flat-out that they would fight to the death if I put them together, no matter what. 8| I told them I'd "be careful, and can I see one please?" Ugh. :P
Anyways all the large ratties they had were the same coloring as Jake, which was a little annoying, I did want to be able to tell them apart quickly. Then I spotted one that was white with a black hood, but with a cute little white star on his forehead, so I asked to see him. While I was petting him a lady and her two friends wandered by and went ga-ga and soon both myself and the lady were petting the rat. He was all about being petted. He fluffed up and looked around and kinda smacked his lips and washed his face and then he shoved his head between my fingers like "pet harder, dammit!" So I bought him. :)
I didn't just *throw* them together. I put them together in my 10-gallon with Jake's (inherited from my late newt) cave while I cleaned out the 20-L and set it up for two rats (temporarily, of course). They were getting along fine so I put them into the 20-L. No, no quarantine period. No week of supervised playtimes together to make sure they wouldn't fight. Maybe I'm a horrible ratmom but considering that this all started because Duchess wouldn't eat, I wasn't going to go through loads of trouble.
Well, Elwood decided, I guess, that he was The Boss, and he started sitting on top of the cave and attacking Jake whenever the latter tried to come out for something to eat or drink. As there was no blood, and Elwood was just kinda...forcing Jake onto his back and sitting on him until Jake gave up and went back into the cave, I didn't think it was too pressing a deal. I went to bed. But before I left to go shopping the next day I took Jake and his cave and set him up with food and water in the 10 gallon just so I'd be sure he was getting to eat and drink. Elwood seemed really depressed that I took Jake away and just huddled in the back corner of the tank behind the wheel, and apparently stayed there all day.
Well after I set up the new cage (and I haven't the heart to take Jake's cave from him so it's in there, on the bottom floor) they both ran around (Jake tends to want to hover near the cave though, he never left the bottom floor) and got along fine and finally both crammed themselves into the cave and went to sleep. So I really think they're fine.
I'm tired.
(Okay I just caught them fighting, but I know some scuffling is normal, and there still isn't any blood. They're just being boy rats.)