Hello, help needed to make my cage better

The Rat Shack Forum

Help Support The Rat Shack Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

Pingu87

New Member
Joined
Jul 2, 2020
Messages
3
Location
Bristol UK
Hello, nice to meet you all!
I am pingu and I have 4 baby boy ratties. They are, Atticus (only one grey patch on his face), Scabbers (two grey patches on face), Splinter (black patches) and Remie (he also has two grey patches on his face, but they are bigger and he is overall much smaller).
I have literally had them since birth, long story, but came home to a pile of babies after one of my two (rescued) females gave birth. They all seemed good, I have been handling them since they were a week old, mummy rat (Annie) was happy etc. I have had rats before but never new babies!
Anyway, I had them all vet checked and the 4 boy babies all showed signs of chromodacryorrhea but the girls all good.

So The boys are now 12 weeks old and both Splinter and Remie have little to no use of their back legs. This is something I’ve never come across this and I’m looking for ideas to make sure they are happy and healthy. They have a Zeno 3 empire cage at my place and they have a Furat plus rat cage at my friends. In the Furat cage, Remie will climb and be a bit more playful, but I haven’t seen Splinter climb in ages. Remie doesn’t climb in the Zeno cage.

Both cages have multiple levels, ladders, ropes etc. I will share some photos. But clearly it’s not good enough for my boys and I want it to be. So does anyone have any ideas, information etc etc etc please tell me!! I love these boys, more than I can describe and I just want them to have a good life.

Attachments
 
I don't understand. What's wrong with the cage? It looks nice to me. If they get lots of free range time then I don't see an issue. Giving them lots of time out of it and only using it for security at night or when you're out seems totally normal to me.
 
I rigged a backpack to wear on my front and take my girls out for walks. It's an awesome bonding time too. THis is something you can do with yours too. It enriches them so much.
 
I am not familiar with the cages you mentioned so do not know what the floor space is.
With handicapped rats, you want a huge amount of floor space because they may be unable to climb or climbing may be unsafe.
You will want to hang hammocks that they can easily get in and out of ..... for my seniors who have hed (hind end degeneration) I hang hammocks so they can crawl into them.
Handicapped ratties need soft padded floors, that are changed frequently - such as twice a day. I use second hand baby quilts, some people use the original vetbed https://vetbedcanada.com/shop/ols/products/vetbed-original Which I believe is from the UK
You will want to make sure they can easily access water (at least 2 sources need to be available) and that they are able to easily eat the food you provide.

Here is a thread about the roly poly babies .... their pregnant mamas were rescued and while many of their babies were normal and were rehomed to good loving homes when they were old enough, several of the babies were born handicapped and this impacted their mobility ... some more then others. This thread is about 10 years old but the videos are still on youtube, just copy the address and put it into the address bar on youtube. I added some of the videos to the end of the thread today. The Roly Poly Babies-The babies are 2 years old now :)

Chromodacryorrhea in rats is known as porphyrin and all rats experience this. It can be a sign of illness, a blocked tear duct, stress, etc Health Guide: Porphyrin Secretions / Red Tears

With the right support, Splinter and Remie should be able to have good, happy lives. Do you know why they are unable to walk? Have they always had mobility issues or is this recent?

Please tell give me more info re your cages and I will make some suggestions
 
Last edited:
Back
Top