Pet Forum / Mammals / Rats / October 2003

Well, they're not actually babies -- they're three months old.  But
they are adorable.  We picked them up yesterday.  Their previous
owner's landlord changed the pet rules when the lease was renewed, so
she couldn't keep them.  They came with their own homemade cage, which
needs some major work -- it's made out of hardware cloth like mine,
but the edges haven't been properly filed down and it's not held
together very firmly.  It's also made out of way more parts than mine,
so it may actually be less work to build a new cage on the base, and
use some of the existing pieces as ledges or something.

Anyway, the rats are as follows:

Ariadne:  Apricot hooded with a huge fat stripe.  She seems pretty
brave.
Niobe:  Apricot capped with a tiny spot on her back.  She is a tiny
little thing, and very people-oriented.  She also likes running in the
wheel that came with them.  She'll need a bigger one soon. The  Wodent
Wheel Senior looks pretty good -- can anyone recommend a good (that
is, low shipping costs to Pennsylvania)  source for these?
Astraea: Russian blue with white feet and a little white spot on her
tummy.  She's a bit shy, and doesn't seem to get along that well with
Ariadne, but she was the first to charge off and explore the desk.

They are all super-sweet.  We took them downstairs to meet our (much
nicer) landlord, and they charmed him too, because they are adorable
tiny little friendly rats, who I will have pictures of soon....

--Theresa
http://tiger_spot.mapache.org