Hi everyone,
I have a solo male rat after his brother sadly had to be put to sleep a few months ago. He is roughly 1.5 - 2 years old and has always been the sweetest boy, always wanting cuddles and loving to be stroked and play. Yesterday he was his normal self very sweet and playful. He gets time outside his cage for 2 hours + a day and he always has the radio on for background noise when I am out.
Today however he really turned on me, I got him out the cage as usual and left him to free roam where I can see him. He appears very healthy and eats and drinks and was hopping around excitedly.
He wanted to jump on me as usual so I let him climb up and he took a chunk out of my arm! I didn't do anything different from usual and he jumped up of his own accord.
I let him calm down and later on he wanted to get up onto me again, this time he bit my neck and hands frantically. i put him back in his cage calmly, but now when I come near the cage he creeps out with very tense body language looking as if he wants to pounce. He even attempted to smash and bite at the bars to get at me!
I am very shocked as he is such a sweety usually, we have a very close bond and i'm at a loss to think why hes become like this so suddenly. he is not fearful just determined to get me!
Anyone have any suggestions or have seen anything like this before? My first reaction was that he is in pain, yet he comes to me to attack me, if he was hurting I would expect him to keep himself to himself and be quiet.
Sorry for the long post can anyone advise me?
I have a solo male rat after his brother sadly had to be put to sleep a few months ago. He is roughly 1.5 - 2 years old and has always been the sweetest boy, always wanting cuddles and loving to be stroked and play. Yesterday he was his normal self very sweet and playful. He gets time outside his cage for 2 hours + a day and he always has the radio on for background noise when I am out.
Today however he really turned on me, I got him out the cage as usual and left him to free roam where I can see him. He appears very healthy and eats and drinks and was hopping around excitedly.
He wanted to jump on me as usual so I let him climb up and he took a chunk out of my arm! I didn't do anything different from usual and he jumped up of his own accord.
I let him calm down and later on he wanted to get up onto me again, this time he bit my neck and hands frantically. i put him back in his cage calmly, but now when I come near the cage he creeps out with very tense body language looking as if he wants to pounce. He even attempted to smash and bite at the bars to get at me!
I am very shocked as he is such a sweety usually, we have a very close bond and i'm at a loss to think why hes become like this so suddenly. he is not fearful just determined to get me!
Anyone have any suggestions or have seen anything like this before? My first reaction was that he is in pain, yet he comes to me to attack me, if he was hurting I would expect him to keep himself to himself and be quiet.
Sorry for the long post can anyone advise me?