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my rats continue to be adorable
Nov. 4th, 2009 08:50 pmThey now all come up onto my hand when I put it in the cage, and climb onto me and sit on my shoulder. They now also let me pet them. They are not yet comfortable to be grabbed and picked up, and they haven't yet learned to come when I call either, so I won't let them run outside yet. But they are definitely interested in exploring outside the cage, so I have to be watchful now.
In preparation for future playtime I have made a simple enclosure from wooden panels connected with cable binders that I can put up to let them play outside while they are very little without guarding every tiny opening between, beneath or into my furniture, so that may happen soon. Previously I just let tiny ones play in the whole room like adults, but it is just extremely stressful to keep track of them when they are tiny. My last ones squeezed themselves beneath my mattress for example and in all sorts of places, even with me doing my best to block all gaps between walls and furniture and make the room safe. Obviously it's more interesting for them if they can explore the whole room, but they will have to make do for the sake of my nerves.
I mean, the size of the enclosure will be all of the center of the room so they can run further than in the cage if they like, and obviously I will put in something for them to climb, and hide, and such for entertainment. I have a large branch now, but I'm looking into whether there are maybe cat scratching tree combos that would maybe work for rats as a more varied playground. I've also seen a kind of ferret play tree in a pet store that looked real nice and good for rats (probably because they are closer in size than cats), but it was quite expensive unfortunately (the ones for cats were too). So I'm still looking for something like that.
Finally, I have decided to go with Linus and Leo for the new names I wasn't decided on yet.
In preparation for future playtime I have made a simple enclosure from wooden panels connected with cable binders that I can put up to let them play outside while they are very little without guarding every tiny opening between, beneath or into my furniture, so that may happen soon. Previously I just let tiny ones play in the whole room like adults, but it is just extremely stressful to keep track of them when they are tiny. My last ones squeezed themselves beneath my mattress for example and in all sorts of places, even with me doing my best to block all gaps between walls and furniture and make the room safe. Obviously it's more interesting for them if they can explore the whole room, but they will have to make do for the sake of my nerves.
I mean, the size of the enclosure will be all of the center of the room so they can run further than in the cage if they like, and obviously I will put in something for them to climb, and hide, and such for entertainment. I have a large branch now, but I'm looking into whether there are maybe cat scratching tree combos that would maybe work for rats as a more varied playground. I've also seen a kind of ferret play tree in a pet store that looked real nice and good for rats (probably because they are closer in size than cats), but it was quite expensive unfortunately (the ones for cats were too). So I'm still looking for something like that.
Finally, I have decided to go with Linus and Leo for the new names I wasn't decided on yet.