Ratablog

Bandit's backstory

I haven't really had time to post lately, so I wasn't very good about providing the details of Bandit's first week here, and what his previous family had seen with him.

For the first few days Bandit was here, I thought he looked utterly terrified. Every time I'd go to the cage, he'd take the t-shirt and pull it up like he was trying to build a wall between us. I started wondering if he was very defensive and territorial, so any time I needed to take something from the cage, I made sure I left a treat first...if I was taking his food dish out, first I'd put in a bowl of yogurt, that kind of thing.

Then, Holly told me that Bandit used to bite her when she was feeding him or cleaning his cage, which also sounds like very territorial behavior. And, I'd met Holly's other rats...they were all very mellow and social, and when she opened the cage they just came out and started free-ranging the apartment like they owned the place. (We about died laughing seeing one of the boys march right to the kitchen!) Bandit, on the other hand, wouldn't come out of his box.

Not that I'm a rat psychologist, but the picture started coming into focus...I think Bandit is more of a loner than the rest of his pack was, and he bites to defend his space or his stuff. He's also realized that biting gets him left alone, which he prefers.

Last week, everything we did was designed to make him comfortable in his new cage. I think it worked well...after a few days he wasn't putting up the shirt barrier or diving into the box every time we opened the door, and as Victor said, he even took food from our fingers.

I think that on Monday he probably was telling me "You come into my space on my terms, not yours." He wanted to be left alone just then, so he was using his "Get lost" trick.

We have had two other rats that bit (besides George...while his bite was dramatic and costly, it wasn't at all his typical behavior), and they were like Bandit to a degree. They didn't want us bugging them until it was their idea. What we did...and it took a lot of bites in the process...was we handled them until they learned that we were alpha.

Since Holly has a young child, she can't afford to let Bandit hang around biting until he figues out that biting won't get him left alone. We're hoping that whatever makes him this high-strung is hormonal, and we expect to have him neutered next month. That should calm him down, and that's when I expect the trust training to really be successful.

Posted by Abita at December 21, 2005 04:54 PM