How I Introduced My 3 Younger Rats to My 2 Older Girls 

🤣🤣 if it can crawl it can brawl.

Cream is a fighter.

Awww 🥰 💋💋

Ikr?!😂 Fight! Fight! Oh, All is well now! (1 second later)

I think it was more along the lines of “I hate you!! - ooh you smell yummy! Hold that thought, I have to eat first!” I swear rats always think with their stomachs - Cream in particular would do ANYTHING (and I mean anything from letting me dress her up as a pumpkin to walking on a leash or just sitting on her butt for 10 minutes) for food. A nice exploit I could use when she was being a butt and hating her new friends - funny enough after the babies took over Cream went throughout 4 more intros and excepted each new rat without a second thought (maybe she just gave in to the stream of new friends lol)

@@ShadowTheRat oh yeah, probably, lol!!

hate what:

I have 6 pet rats, 2 adults, Jupiter and remy, the brother rats Then 4 baby rats, peanut, teddy, Snow (albino rat), and then Neptune

Cookies tastes delicious too!🤤🍪

🤣😂🤣😂

Lol she was really into grooming the older girls, IDK why but she was quite insistent!

Donna Hilton cringe

@@dash33r22 you're cringe

rosenrot234 my rats do that when I kiss them😁😂😂

@hailee friedrichsmyer Yeah that's a common rat thing they do. Just "No human. Do not want." Thankfully the ones I had were down for other smooches like on their back or tummy. Just not the face.

This definitely isn't my favorite method, unfortunately with some rats this is the only way to get them to learn to get along. Luckily its been months now and they love their DCN :)

Babies will be babies lol, my poor older girls were just done with their shenanigans :P Of course if they had been nice and accepted the babies from the start they wouldn’t of had to go through this ordeal

That's awesome! My intro last year was pretty much like that, back then Cookie and Cream were just tiny babies and I had 2 older girls called Latte and Blackberry. I actually didn't even do the carrier method with them because when I showed the older girls the babies they immediately tried to start licking them through the cage bars, and taking this as a good sign I tried letting them interact in their play area. Took about 15 seconds for the older girls to sniff and accept the babies (no pinning, no rough grooming, just instantly accepted the babies and let them do whatever). That was that and from then on they lived together peacefully! Unfortunately Cookie and Cream didn't pick up strange rat etiquette from their older friends and made this intro much more difficult. Luckily its all over but I really hope I get to experience more intros like last years in the future!

They were so small back then, they're growing like weeds now! Cream really had issues with the babies lol it took quite a bit to convince her to just accept them! Funny enough she accepted my newest rat addition Marshmallow no issue so maybe she just really doesn't like baby rats :P

@straight jacket i mean in some days I feel like cream feels with my own kids.. its not magic, its parenting and its a really hard job. "Rasing kids was so easy" said no one ever...

@@ralirizzo263 A single child is much easier. I think Kids plural is much, much harder work, and three is exponentially harder.

CongRATs on your soon to be new ratty!

Shadow The Rat THANK YOU! I just got her, she's a little sweetie and I'm gonna try to introduce them over the weekend. She's a lil sick so I'm also waiting because of that (they're in seperate cages rn).

@@amazingdoodles6806 it’s been two years...how are your lil kiddos now?

Rebecca Ripley out of curiosity, because carrier method is most safest & used method in UK, what method to do use?

Rat guro does the side by side cage swap method. You house the rats side by side in seperate cages and swap stuff & rats. They meet in neutral territory and don't stay together until they 100% get along. Rebecca, that works fine for none-aggressive rats but if you saw my rat Cream when the babies were housed next to her cage and if you saw her lunging for the babies throat and neck in NEUTRAL space (without the baby food) then you'd know that that method would never work with her. She needed the carrier method and contrary to what you think this leads to less fighting because the small space adds stress and stressed out social animals are more likely to bond because safetyu in numbers. Stick 2 humans in a large open space and most likely they won;'t interact, stick them together in a closet and they'll bond over trying to figure out what's going on and trying to get out. Obviously don't do that but you see my point. The reason you might dislike this method is because it uses flooding, a method not seen in very positive light now in psychology. The premisis is if your exposed to a stimuli enough over time you get descensitized to it. Now it can go the other way with you getting more sensitive to it or lead to learned helplessness which is why we no longer use it that much with humans or animals. But in the case of introducing rats it works to bond them quickly and safely and I'd say its better to add more stress for a short period then end up with an injured or dead rat.

it depends on how your rats react I will do the rat guru's method too, but some work better with this one!

Shadow The Rat Did Cream ever draw blood on the babies? I’m having a difficult time introducing my 9 month old rat to my 4 month old babies. My older rat, Wasabi, bit one of the babies, Noodle, in the face and obviously drew blood. Noodle was okay but I was worried. Wasabi nipped his ear the next time when I only let them smell each other. When I do bathtub introductions I haven’t let Wasabi run free with them because he tries to bite them on the face or anywhere else he can. I guess I’m just having a difficult time making the jump to putting them together because I’m worried about the babies. Wasabi seems really interested in their smell and when he sees them. He had two older brothers that he adored but they passed unexpectedly 5 months ago. Wasabi has always been slightly high energy and nervous with a flair for dram but I don’t want to subject him to a life alone. Sorry this is long but I’m just having trouble making the jump to allowing them together. Also if he bites them and draws blood immediately, what would you do?

@@AshleySmith-vj4sb use the carrier method

Same

Yeah honestly I would omit this step because it rewards them for fighting which is the exact opposite of what you want. I have done the carrier method before without meat baby food slathering and it worked out great, and they seemed to fight far less than these five did.

@@donnagerudah5634 water as an alt?

@@donnagerudah5634 I don't wanna compare too much, but after seeing other carrier method versions and this one, the baby food's the only difference I noticed. And yeah it seems like it *does* have an impact on the fighting. It seemed to flare up once everyone was somewhat clean.

I think the point is that the flighting was happening anyways. And technically the food is rewarding the good social behaviors (grooming and close contact.) Since they have to engage in those to get said food.

So the positive association is being made with grooming and toleration, not fighting.

Huh, I didn't notice that. Out of these 5 rats Cream's the only one that really tends to fear poop but even she didn't do that here.

Great to hear!

Glad you found the video useful! :)

Thanks again girl :)

Glad to hear! The only thing I'd say is if you only have one baby, I'd highly recommend another similar aged one be added as well. Not only does it make intros safer (since not all attention is directed to one baby, plus it makes them more confident and so less likely to trigger the adults to pick on them) but it also allows her to have a playmate so she doesn't just annoy the older rat. Plus if your older girl is 2 years old that means she will most likely pass much before the baby, which means another potentially stressful intro. Disregard this if you have two babies of course, but again if not I'd highly recommend getting the baby a same aged friend as well.

Awe thank you!

Same!

Thank you! :)

XD

Personally I've never held much weight to using vanilla, I get the idea but to me thinking that a drop of strange smell on 2 rats will make them think they're part of the same group doesn't make sense. If this were the case then just bathing a rat with soap should make their cagemates treat them like strangers but I've never seen this happen. I can see the vanilla having a similar effect to the mat baby food in that it might make the rats wet and make them smell strange themselves and thus distract them from fighting, but I just don't see it tricking them into thinking they're part of the same group. That's actually why I'm much more inclined to go with liquid treats, I don;'t think it makes the rats think they're part of the same group but rather makes them wet and a bit uncomfortable so that they prioritize grooming over fighting while also encouraging them to gently lick each other to get yummy liquid food.

@@ShadowTheRat Yes I see that now. Well it is never to late to learn. I did not do to many intros. The last one failed as it was with male rats. I neutered the lonely male and gave him some sisters. He was a happy boy with al his girlfriends. That intro was so easy!

Funny enough once she accepted the younger girls here and once Espresso took over (she still rules over her now 11 other cagemates today!) Cream became super accepting and over the next few months accepted 4 new rats straight into her cage without any other sort of intro. Definite interesting to see how certain rats can change how the entire group acts towards new rats!

I agree :P

Thanks :)

Thank you :)

I swear she was so dramatic, silly rattie!

very glad you decided to get rats! although, if you do still currently only have one ratty, i would advise getting another asap, as rats are social animals and need the companionship of other rats in order to live a fulfilling life. hope you and the rat(s) are doing well though!!

Just keep in mind that if neutrals go well you don’t need to go to this extreme. The majority of my intros have been done on my lap with the rats living together immediately after that. But sometimes it takes some extra effort and that’s what I was showing in this video. Good luck with your intros!

Thank you! We introduced them and there was not a single fight the babies just really liked my adult rats and now they are living in the same cage! ❤️🐀🐀🐀🐀

Hah the expression “don’t poke the sleeping bear” comes to mind when I saw Espresso pushing her luck with Cream. Funny enough she actually did become the most dominant rat in the cage - once Cream accepted her and was pinned by Espresso a few times (who never got to more than half Creams size lol) she never again had issues accepting new rats. In fact I did 4 more intros with Cream involved and each time she happily accepted rats ranging 6 weeks to 1.5+ years - just goes to show how the group and top rat influences all the individuals. Even now with Espresso being over a year and my group containing 12 rats I still haven’t had any difficult intros since the one seen here - all intros consist of now is letting Espresso meet the new ones outside the cage, them being either pinned once or if they submit immediately she accepts them as well without issue, and then I can place all new rats into the cage without cleaning it or anything else and everyone will follow Espressos lead and accept them as she has. Just a great little ratty who has changed my rat group for the better!

That's so cool! It might be too complicated for rats though...

@@animalobsessed1 Oh that's definitely not too complicated for rats, as long as you know how to train them

That ISNT good

Heh thankfully they don't actually want to eat each other, so it just encourages them to be gentle and groom.

Its not because they view you as an alpha, its because they feel safe and comfortable around you so being with you relaxes both of the rats. When you are present, they know you provide safety. When left alone, they are stressed and feel threatened by a stranger.