I had a friend wondering why their pet rat is so irritated all the time, and it was so frustrating when they didn't understand when I was like "it might be cause u have one rat and not like three, your rat needs rats" and they're like WHA and it's like... you're the rat owner and you don't understand this
yeah, being kept alone can definitely make rats irritable. rats are not solitary animals, and they absolutely need other rat friends. i'm glad you were able to tell your friend that their rat needs some friends. i hope they took it seriously. it's unfortunate how common it is to get pets without fully understanding what they need. a lot of people are still willing to improve the care they give their pets, even though they didn't do proper research.
Very lovely rats! Their cage is also competently organised. I've also have had big rat pack, but now I can't give them enough attention, so I'm not buying new ones for now. Envy you ❤
thank you! i put a lot of thought into their cage. i'm glad it shows! they can definitely be a lot of work. i'm pretending that i'll never have to downsize my group, but i know it's always a possibility
they are so cute im jealous :( i have 2 but im struggling to keep the smell out of the room. They pee everywhere, but do poop in the litter, just the pee not controllable, I tried almost everything I could find on the internet
What type of bedding are you using? Rats dribble a little pee when they walk, it's to mark territory or something, so it can be really hard to get them to pee in a certain area so you might have a better time switching to a bedding that asorbs smells better or is easier to regularly clean
Some males have quite strong smell in pee ☺️ My rats made smellier pee when I was away from home - they probably marked their territory more strongly to protect it when protecting gigant rat (me) was not present 💝
in general rats love getting scratches! in my experience there's a lot of variation in how each rat prefers to receive affection. for my rats this ranges from being picked up constantly and played with "roughly", to being pet very gently and sitting on my lap only when they choose to. rats are very affectionate and love when their people give them attention, but the way that manifests is different for every rat
Realistically, most rodents are gonna be closer to dogs in behavior than they will be to cats. There are exceptions, but rodents generally form large colonies and this necessitates being sociable.
