Pet Forum / Mammals / Rats / July 2005

Tonight the rats are officially getting a new playground.  For the past
almost year (I got my first rattie last August!) the rats have had their
out/play time in our master bathroom.  It's quite big and has a big jacuzzi
area with a nice landing and I've had them set up with ladders and a Barbie
dream house.  Some of you will remember I've had issues with the amount of
marking, and those issues have been quite magnified since the heat and
humidity have come!  Blech.

Tonight I scrubbed the whole place top to bottom - we're talking hours of
work and tons of cleaner and I am sorry to report that my master bath STILL
smells like rats.  It occured to me that while the tile is very easy to
clean, the grout is not so easy to clean and now I have rat-grout.  sigh.
Plus, I think the rats are tired of that place anyway.  They are so totally
bored with their Quaker Oats box tunnels.

So <drum roll> the rats are getting a new playpen in the living room, right
near their cage, and it's going to consist of a couple of layers of washable
towels and flannel blankets, the Barbie dream house will move out there, and
there will be a newly built rattie-gym and nice big cardboard walls suitable
for chewing and barrier purposes. I think it will give them even more room
than they had before. Construction will take a couple of days and then I'll
post a picture of the masterpiece.

This way I don't have to sit on the toilet watching them play, I can
actually sit in my rocker.  The only drawback is the cats will have to be
locked away, but that's no big deal.  I am SO kicking myself for not having
done this sooner, and now I'm just trying to figure out how to get the smell
out of the grout.  Anyone have any ideas??

Also, I still haven't given up on the rat diaper/loincloth idea even though
all my prototypes have been dismal failures.  I just wish I could set them
loose in the house without finding little wet trails everywhere.

Meghan