Ratablog

Bandit update

I've been working with Bandit nightly, taking him out of the cage for twenty to thirty minutes, in the bathroom (in case he should jump out of my hands. For a house with so many rats in it, we sure haven't ratproofed anyplace). He's been very good, for the most part.

Typically he'll shake like a leaf for the first five to ten minutes. If he has to go to the bathroom, he'll normally poop between the ten and fifteen minute mark. He's learned to climb up to my shoulder, and it's on my shoulder that he'll pee--usually on my neck as he crosses from left to right and right to left.

He's gotten to the point where he'll groom a couple of times, and I can usually get him to brux and boggle toward the end. This makes me feel a little better about him.

On the other hand, he's still showing some aggresive and territorial tendencies. He's still not thrilled with us going into his cage, and the other day he started huffing at me and Abita. He's also bitten Abita once and me twice.

The first time he bit me was last week, when he was on my shoulder and I reached up to scratch his ear. He didn't like that apparently, and he struck out and got me on my finger. I've no explanation for that at all.

The second time was this morning--I was trying to hand him a treat (I give him something by hand every morning, hoping to get him used to us) when he lunged at my hand and gave me two cuts on my thumb. None of the bites, however, were very serious.

The other night, we spent some time discussing what to do with him. When we adopted him we had originally planned to have him neutered next week; now, we're not so sure. It's possible he may prefer to be an alone rat and if that's the case, we don't see a reason to put him thru surgery.

We're considering intro'ing him to either Arthur or Oliver, just to see how he reacts to other rats. It will be a long process, but we're going to keep on trying.

Posted by Publius at January 5, 2006 09:17 PM