Ratablog

Bob in black & white

A nice artsy picture (thanks, Victor) of Bob and me. Bob is becoming quite the cuddly little guy lately.

Rat therapy

Another day at the rat spa.

I'm sorry to do this, Schwartzy

I oughta be ashamed on myself, embarrassing her like this.

(Just so no one worries...the box was empty.)

Waiting for Santa

Witter peeks around the igloo to see if it is sleigh bells he hears.

Anakin

Anakin, the rat with pneumonia, didn't make it. I've been practically glued to my computer since Wednesday night looking for updates, hoping so much that the little guy'd pull through.

I feel almost as crushed as I would if he were mine, and my heart goes out to his family.

Good rat news.

Deb Price, writing in the (Bay Area) Mercury News, tells the story of a little rat who needed some help crossing the road.

Bob's Christmas picture

I have this as my wallpaper on my work computer, and on the cards I'm sending out.

Stuff on my mind, rat-wise:
There's a rat from RP with pneumonia that I'm worrying about now, and one I just read about this morning who may have eated poison the owners had resorted to for wild mice. And Bob's little skin thing is turning back into a lump. And a few other RP folks have lost rats this week. It's been sad, so I'm trying to focus on the precious part of the rat equation, not the fragile part.

So, does Bob look smug in this picture, or what?

Precious and fragile

One of our friends lost a rat yesterday. She was nearly two and going in for tumor surgery, and she didn't recover from the anesthesia.

Our friend is devastated, of course. I can't even think of how to comfort her.

Rats usually recover well, but there's always the chance...

The alternative, letting the lumps grow, is a chance, too. A year ago I had to put Krycek to sleep. She had multiple tumors, and though I thought I was doing the right thing by not subjecting her to surgery, I found her one day bleeding from where the skin over the tumor had broken open. I thought my baby was going to bleed to death before I got her to the vet, and once at the vet I knew there was nothing to do but end it.

I have never felt so guilty.

My point is, you can never know for sure how it will end, so the right thing to do is the best you can do. Treat them with the love and respect they deserve, and know that they are fragile creatures with lifespans far shorter than ours. A day for them is so much greater a percentage of their whole life...it reminds me how precious a day is.

The "thing" on Bob's skin is a lump, a lump getting bigger every day. Bob's had quite a long life for a rat...39 months or so, the first 30 in a small shoebox of a cage in a lab. All I can do now is let him know, every day we have left, how precious he is.

Rat spa treatment

Not a spa for rats, but a spa treatment employing the services of rats.

I thought of this the other night. I had the girls out on the bed for play time, but I wasn't feeling so hot so I layed down on the bed, too, and started to doze off.

Next thing I knew, I had a dozen little rattie feet running across my legs, back, and shoulders. It wasn't quite a massage (the girls aren't quite that heavy) and it was more than a tickle. All in all, quite relaxing.

Then I cracked myself up imagining a posh spa: the lavender-sage aromatherapy candles lit, the water trickling from the tabletop fountain, the vibraharp New Age music playing softly. The client lays down in a thick white robe...

...and the therapist releases the rats.

Last night, Leather decided to groom Victor's nose. "A rat facial," I said. "That costs extra."

Bedtime for Bob

But I do wish he wouldn't sleep like this...scares the heck out of me.

And boy is he peeved when I wake him up to make sure he's still alive!

Shave and a haircut...

Well, by the time I got up this morning I changed my mind about "watchful waiting" for Bob, and he went to the vet this afternoon.

At first the doc said he agreed with me that it looked like a tumor, but he felt it and gave Bob a shave to get a better look, then said it seemed more like a wound. Since Bob lives alone and doesn't get playtime with the others, and there aren't any sharp edges on his cage, a wound seems weird...but better than a tumor, at least. Anyway, the vet decided to scrape the dark tissue, and darned if it didn't come off...making me feel like an idiot for bringing Bob in because he was dirty.

No, the vet said, there's still something going on on the skin. We've got Nolvasan and a topical antibiotic to treat it for a week, and see what happens.

It still might be a tumor...but maybe it isn't (all fingers crossed!), and now that he's shaved, keeping an eye on it will be easier.

Introducing Witter

If you've looked at the main Ratinabox page, you know Witter is an alone rat. That doesn't keep him from not being interested in the other rats, nor does it really keep us from trying to introduce him to the main gang. So far, tho, we've had no luck, and it breaks my heart.

Witter is a very loving rat--to people. To other rats, though...I suspect it's been so long since he's been with other rats, he's forgotten how to act.

The introduction process isn't a difficult one to understand. Recognizing that rats, like dogs, tell one another apart by smell, one tries to get around that by making all the rats smell alike. Vanilla extract on the rump takes care of that.

Also since (like dogs) rats are territorial, one should take care to do the initial introductions on neutral territory. Bathtubs are ideal for that, as are beds (covered with plastic, then with clean blankets or towels).

When we first tried to intro him to the Rink Rats, he chased after them, grooming them as he caught them, then laying down before the just-groomed rat, in an attempt to be groomed in turn. We did this for several sessions, with each session lasting twenty to thirty minutes. Only once was he groomed--by Metro, and we managed to get a photo of it:

There was also a lot of squeeking, most of it from Witter, but no real aggressive moves (Anne's excellent Norway Rat Behavior Repertoire goes into great detail about aggression in rats and how to recognize what one should worry about vs. what one shouldn't worry about). We felt things were actually going quite well (no blood) and we bought a cage large enough for five rats--a Martins Rat Skyscraper.

So during an intro session, without vanilla, the large cage was prepared, and all five rats went into it when the intro session was over. And I waited...and waited...and waited, while the five rats just froze, Witter next to the door, and the Rink Rats spread above him.

A few scuffles broke out (broken up with a paper towel roll) but there was no mingling, and I was worried. Perhaps I was being too anthropomorphic, but Witter looked like the new kid in school, and he wasn't getting along with anybody.

Scared, I think, is the word. He looked scared.

After several hours, I opened the cage door, bent my elbow into the cage, and Witter jumped on it. I closed the cage door, and the Rink Rats started acting as they normally do. Witter went into his small cage, visibly relieved (to me). I gave him a yogie.

We still try to intro Witter to the boys, but the behaviour has turned aggressive: there's lots of piloerection of the hairs (hair standing on end--we usually say he's puffy), sidling up to the other rats, some boxing and kicking, and, I'm sorry to say, one full-out fight (broken up by dumping all the rats out of the play tent they were in).

After Curly passed away, we tried to intro Witter to the girls, and it was a no-go. He nipped at Leather and was puffy the whole time, and since he's so much larger then they are, we cut the intro session short.

Today, during playtime, we tried letting him on the bed with both the boys and the girls (they play together just like kids) a couple of times. Again, Witter was puffy pretty much the whole time, and he sidled up to the boys (those who weren't hiding from him, that is). Leather and Pinky at least sniffed at him, and he sniffed back. He chased after the boys, and I ended the first short session after a sidling and hissing/puffing move.

The next session was even shorter, ended when Witter chased, then tried to mount, Pinky.

In the final session, little Leather was the aggresor, sidling and kicking at Witter. I ended that, nervous that one of them might end up injured.

Witter did try to make friend in his own way, but, as I stated earlier, I don't think he knows exactly how to act around other rats. And it really does break my heart to see him be an alone rat.

The latest in health worries

Every time I make the mistake of thinking "I haven't had to call the vet in a few weeks..."

This evening I found a growth on Bob's back. At first I thought it was a scab, but when I cleaned it off with hydrogen peroxide it became obvious it wasn't dried bllod, just discolored skin. There's a little texture to it, but it isn't thick enough to be a lump. It looks, actually, like the pictures you see in pamphlets about skin cancer.

I'm really concerned that the poor old guy has a tumor, although I haven't been able to find much information about skin cancer in rats. Of course my frantic mind assumes melanoma...and I don't to put him through surgery at his age, especially the way he's been short of breath lately.

He's an old rat...39 months now, if he truly was 2 and a half when we got him. If I stick with what I said when I adopted him, he's in hospice now.

My plan is to watch the skin growth carefully for the next few days, and call the vet if it gets any bigger. At that point we'll discuss surgery, but I have all my fingers crossed that this is just some benign thing, some rat age spot that won't grow.

I got lucky with Curly's tumor...it grew for awhile then flaked away. I hope his brother has the same tumor-fighting genes.

Home for the Holidays

Hey, are you just gonna spend the month of December posting pictures of the rats dressed up for Christmas?

Well...yeah, probably.