Fear based aggressionwith towards humans

[Ratturtles]

I adopted a ten month old rat from a shelter. Ive had her for about three weeks now. Introducing her to my resident rat was a breeze, they were besties within five days. But she has aggression problems when it comes to any interaction with people. She has bitten me twice now, hard enough to draw blood. Im not sure the best approach to take with her. She will take treats from me, and rather nicely, but when I don't have a treat ready to go shell lunge for whatever she can bite at first. For the time being Ive been trying to pet her for a few minutes everyday with her inside her cage, but she does not seem to be responding very well to that, she just hunkers down and her heart rate increases. If I catch her when shes not hiding, as soon as she sees me she scurries away super fast. This is my first non friendly rat so Im unsure of the best approach to take with her. Should I keep petting her daily until she gets used to me?

 

[SQ]

Glad that you adopted the little girl
Great that she is introed to your other rattie and that they are living together.
Your other rat will help her learn to trust people …. who knows what her prior experiences with people were or what trauma she may have experienced
She has been through a lot of changes in the last 3 weeks …. wonderful that she is able to take treats nicely from you.
Talk to her, when you offer her treats have the treat on your palm, holding your hand flat, and have your hand ready with the treat when you offer it to her.
Make sure your hands do not smell like food as rats have poor eye sight and may mistake fingers etc for food I would give her more time before starting to pet her since she does not feel safe ...… take it slow and go at her speed. She will see her friend enjoying interacting with you and as she learns to trust you and to feel safe, she will gradually approach you

Please see joinrats.com for a lot of helpful information on things you can do to help her to learn to trust you.

Do you have a large rat safe play area where the girls get out to play and run, climb and explore, where you can sit with them and interact? A play area where they hopefully have access to their cage so they can go in and out of their cage. (See playpens and enrichment in the Reference Thread)

I hope that you will keep us updated
and post lots of pictures