Hi guys! It is my first time ever owning a rat, well, at least for me. My mom has kept them in the house (as pets ofc) for quite a while. I recently got new acrylic nails, and one of the rats that I started to get super attached to, keeps coming up to me for scratches. When I scratch him, sometimes he makes a weird squeaking noise. Is this good or bad? I just want to make sure I’m not hurting him!

Hi everyone. This will be a long one, so thank you to anyone who can take the time!
One of our boys (1 y 7 mo) has had respiratory issues for the past 4-5 months. After getting a first set of xrays, vet (exotic) said it’s broncho-pneumonia and that he had lesions on his lungs (tiny spots and a bigger one at the bottom of his lung). After months of trial and error with different antibiotics and daily nebuliser sessions, he stopped making wet noises, but his breathing remained fast (he’s also an anxious little fella, his breathing has never been as slow as his brother). They both tested positive for mycoplasma, but luckily his brother never had any issues.
The smaller spots have disappeared early on, while the bigger one remained unchanged. The thing is, the vet is now saying that the bigger spot is pneumothorax and she wants to draw the air out. Normally, I’d have already gone through with the procedure, but our vet doesn’t have any other rat patients and has never done this procedure on rats. She has also stressed several times how our boy might die during or shortly after the procedure.
The plan is now to send the xrays to several other exotic vets in the country (if we can find some who have treated rats in the past) and get a second opinion on this. We’re also maybe considering a CT scan if a vet absolutely recommends it before doing a needle aspiration.
I guess what I’m asking is if anyone has gone through this before and has a new perspective, or if there is anyone here who can actually read the xrays and offer an opinion. Any help would be greatly appreciated. We just want what’s best for him, and since he is eating, playing and going about his daily business normally, we’re terrified of risking his life unnecessarily. I’m posting the first and last set of xrays, even though we tortured him more times than that…
Thank you once again and sorry for the long post!

grabbies for rat tax!!

My baby has been prescribed f10 antiseptic solution in a nebuliser. I know you connect them to a box and all good with that side, but wondered what machines people here use.

Thank you!!

The crime and the main suspects

This is not the update we wanted to make.
Moss had her surgery yesterday, and all seemed to be going smoothly. The mass was a nasty fibrosarcoma that was firmly planted into the muscle wall, but they got it off, closed her up, and started to wake her up. Suddenly, she went extremely pale and despite attempts to resuscitate her, she passed. The vet asked about performing a necropsy, which we approved. The mass on the surface was just the tip of the iceberg.
Below it, on the other side of the abdominal wall, was a much larger mass originating from her kidney.

Moss has always been a bigger girl. Apart from all the natural variation in size, she was also one of the rats who gained and maintained extra weight after her spay, which made it more difficult to recognize a change. She had gained a bit in recent months, but not an alarming amount. The changes week over week fell right in line with normal fluctuations we see, especially considering we were supplementing many of the rats to help those who had lost significant weight with the SDAV outbreak. The mass felt identical to normal abdominal organs and fat, which means we also missed it on our routine physical health checks until the mass appeared at the surface. Her behavior never really changed over the time it was growing. Even our vet wasn't able to detect it on her exam last week.

If there is an upside to all of this, it's that she passed peacefully under sedation, and that she didn't have to experience any discomfort either from the mass itself or surgical recovery. But despite that, our hearts are heavy. We had such high hopes for her. She was so healthy throughout her two years with US.

This loss comes on the heels of four others in just the past three weeks. Our own boy, Dale Cooper, Ozzie, Hot Pocket, Chowder, and now Moss, gone so close together with no time to grieve.

On top of it all, the medical expenses have piled up and donations have slowed to a trickle. We desperately need help catching up. The financial burden on top of the emotional one is breaking us. We truly appreciate your support, and we know we will recover, but anything you can do to ease the strain is appreciated.

How to help? 🐀💞

V3NMO: @ratwaysanctuary

P4yPal: RatWaySanctuary@gmail.com
More donation options and shop at www.ratwaysanctuary.org

I just got my very first pet rats nine days ago. They're babies, freshly weaned. They're so afraid and skittish and I feel so bad for not having them free roam yet, but I don't know how to make it happen when they're so scared of me :(

I have given them treats on my hand, one is very comfortable climbing up my arm but doesn't like when I move at all.

Any advice is helpful. I just want them to be comfortable, nothing more and nothing less!

I have a cage like this with a very thin bottom, it doesn’t even slide out. Anyways my 2 boys love to make messes 😆🙈 and the bedding undeniably always ends up outside of the cage in large amounts. Not only is it a mess, but it causes me to constantly have to add in a lot more bedding. Trying to figure out how to combat this lol. I’m at the point where I’m thinking of just buying a new cage overall lol- I can’t come up with a creative way to fix this 😆

Post title isn't the clearest but kinda lost here ngl, my university campus has a decentish population of rats and the administration recently expressed a desire to get rid of them seemingly by calling pest control something that a large part of the student body and even some teachers are pretty vocally against and we're trying to find solutions and considering we have no idea if they're fully wild rats or abandoned pets that ended up with offsprings catching and adopting them is one of the proposed ideas and I've been wondering how feasible of an idea it is and surprise surprise Google isn't a big help so figured it was best to ask

She's 2 years old, doesn't eat a lot of treats, nothing unhealthy or anything!!!

Look at their cuteness

my boyfriend works with a guy who breeds and sells rats (outside of work). my boyfriend and I live together, we’ve been researching rats for a long time and we’ve decided we want some. however this coworker of my boyfriend is a red flag to me- first of all he apparently sells his rats between 5-6 weeks old. from my research that’s too early ? and second of all he tried to sell my boyfriend a cage for them that was well below the minimum size requirements. my boyfriend is getting annoyed at me and says the guy is really nice and I’m being paranoid. I want to do this properly though and buy from an ethical breeder who actually cares about the rats. so are these red flags from a rat breeder/seller or is this normal ? :/

Hello everyone. I wanted to share little pipo’s history. I found him under an electric scooter when he was one week old. Been taking care of him ever since. I was very, very worried cause I read that some people had bad experiences with wild rats in forums and Reddit, so I didn’t really wanted to grow too attached to him. He grew up and now is my little treasure, he sleeps with me in my bed, and never leaves my shoulders when I’m cooking or cleaning the house. He has no cage and is free roaming 24/7. The downside is that he won’t get along with his brothers and sisters, the rest of the mischief doesn’t accept him for some reason. He loves every human that comes to visit. Has anyone had a similar experience? Would love to read your histories with wild rats.

Just found him outside in my job courtyard on his own looking for food, he was very very chill and was easily guided into the box. He seemed very tired between food foraging and would rest in the shade and not move. He was also not afraid of humans at all and seemed like he only cared about finding food. I've never owned rats and dont know anything about them! I really dont want him to die. I dont mind nesting him back to health, or turning him over to someone somewhere, or releasing him back, whatever is the right thing to do! Plz help!!!!!! (he's about the size of a lime)

One of my three rats, a 3 months old Dumbo brave and active little thing, has started sneezing every like, 30 seconds, at times. Not all the time though.

I know I oughta bring her to the vet but 1) money is tight tight idiotically because of something unplanned 2) not sure which I should trust with her yet.
Any homemade medicine, tips, things to check?

I suspect it could be her water, and it started after eating some vegan chili sin carne rice with the smallest amount of barbecue and zero actual chili, maybe paprika? But it was an extra small bite and now I am Regrets.

If I made a grave mistake I'd rather know asap by redditors jeering at me than risk it.

hey guys! unfortunately i’m looking to rehome my 2 big boys due to me moving away soon. It honestly breaks my heart knowing i won’t be able to take them with me and being sure that my parents nor sister would care for them.

They’re 6 months old. Remy is a bit shy at first but he’ll eventually come out of his shell, he’s also very energetic. Butterbutt (BB or butters) he’s fully white and is a sweet boy, he’s very loving and loves licking.

If anyone that’s interested please let me know, and if possible i’d love updates here and there about them.

I just want them to have a good loving home.

Hello, my rat Guizmo do sometimes this : he start vibing and do sope noise with his teeths.

It's happen only when I'm close to them or if I was interacting with him / in freeroam.

It is bad or juste an happy rat ?

Also is there any problem with rat sneeze ? Mine do this some times, especially m'y black and why one, Razmo (funny that m'y ancient black and rat one was the one who do it the most time too lol).

Hi there, I’m located in the Chicago suburbs and have wanted rats for a long time but can’t have them right now due to my living situation. I was wondering if anyone knows of any rat rescues in the area that need volunteers or something like that? Please let me know!

Hi guys, i am not a well experienced owner, and I have 2 girls with me. Today i got to buy something in the petstore and found this little precious. I've never tried to identify gender from a rat so young but if its a girl i want to adopt. Can u guys help me?

And her ears are different from my 2 girls, is she from a different type?

Don't let her cuteness fool you, she's a GLUTTONOUS BEAST!!!!!!!!!!!!!

(i love her)