Hi! and Surprise oops litter advice needed

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Kamorth

New Member
Joined
Aug 24, 2018
Messages
1
Location
Campbell River
Hi! I thought I had an account on here and had done an intro post before but my saved log in stuff wouldn't work so I'm back. Meh, it's sorted now. Intro first then advice request.. I'll put a line of asterisks above the litter question if you want to skip to that. I like writing, so this is probably going to get a little long.

I've been a rat mum for a few years now. My first baby was a little old hooded man who was all alone at the SPCA when I went in with a friend (she was looking for a dog). I had to meet him and he immediately sneezed in my hand and then started wuffling in my ear as the staff told me about how he had been brought in by someone who apparently found him as a stray on their porch and the next day Sneezy was setting up camp in his brand new 3 level cage in my living room. A couple of months later, my father in law tried to smuggle Sneezy home after dinner one night because he had fallen in love too. About a week after that my father in law went into hospital after a fall and he asked us to go around to his place to pick up and take care of "the little one" until he was well enough to go home. When we walked into his apartment, the first thing I saw was a huge clear plastic tub with the tiniest little white dumbo rat sitting in the bottom on some paper towels looking like he was about to pop because there were people again finally and he thought he was going to be alone forever. He had a ceramic food dish full of slightly wilted carrots and a half full water bottle duct taped to the inside of the tub and an upside down tissue box with a hole cut in the side in one corner. We told FIL off for not researching rat care properly before buying a baby and promised to teach him what we'd learned when he got home and we brought the still nameless baby back. Sadly, he never got out of the hospital. While we were waiting and hoping the baby acquired the name Dopey and bonded with Sneezy and the two spent many hours dozing on the back of our couch and cuddling while we worked and relaxed. We work from home so cages are basically for when we're asleep. Not long after my father in law passed away, Sneezy finally succumbed to a brain tumour he had had since before he was surrendered to the SPCA. He'd been with us for 5 months and made such an impression that we have never been without rats since.

Dopey seemed a little less bouncy and a little more needy after Sneezy passed, so we started keeping an eye out for a new friend for him and shortly after we moved into a new apartment we found a solo little guy listed as free to a good home on craigslist. He came with a single-level cage and all the other things he needed, and since he wouldn't come out of my hoodie pocket once he got in there we were pretty sure he liked us too and he came home with us that day. He was a baby, only a couple of months old, while Dopey was a little over a year old at this point. Promptly renamed Doc because of his face markings, he and Dopey never really got along. We had them out together a few times, first in the bathtub and later on the couch and our bed, but they never hit it off and after a while started to fight, so they stayed in separate cages and came out either one at a time or in different rooms. Both were cuddly and friendly with us and they were my precious babies so when Dopey had a minor stroke out of nowhere just after his second birthday, I did everything I could to help him recover. He was moved into Doc's single level cage and sat next to me so that I could help him with food and water whenever he needed it and I followed the vet's instructions to the letter. Doc was moved into the bigger cage and not happy about not spending as much time out while I focused on Dopey and my partner was away for a week, but he settled down pretty quickly when he realized he wasn't being totally ignored and would still get cuddles when Dopey was asleep. After two weeks and as lot of very encouraging improvement, Dopey had a second stroke that paralyzed his face and throat and sadly we had to put him to sleep.

Doc loved being a solo rat and having us all to ourselves, and I was heartbroken about Dopey and not ready to face the possibility of having to go through that again, so Doc had us all to himself for about a year. He loved it, but we got a call from the SPCA out of the blue one day. Someone had brought in two baby girls and they weren't really set up to take care of them. Since their files showed that we had adopted the last rat they had had, would we be interested in taking or at least fostering them? Doc was getting older, he'd slowed down a lot and had been moved back to the single level cage after a couple of falls off the higher levels of the bigger one and he was taking regular arthritis medication anyway, so Sleepy (who fell asleep on the ride home) and Bashful (who was reluctant to come out to meet us) joined the family permanently. Doc was VERY interested in the girls, but we kept them very separated because we were not remotely set up or prepared for babies. The girls are a pair of sisters, dumbos, both pink-eyed and pure white except for a tiny smudge of brown on Bashful's nose. Sleepy is slim and hyperactive with an addiction to chewing on cage bars. Even if the cage is open on the floor and she's out running around, she will occasionally get so excited that she has to run up and chew on the bars from the outside. Bashful is a little chubbier and prefers cuddles and sleeping in pockets. The two of them have reminded me why all the heartache when they get to the end of their lives is worth it and I am back to making my "Never not having rats" affirmation every time they do something cute. Like breathing or sleeping or existing. The girls helped me cope when Doc didn't wake up on Christmas day last year and it took them about half an hour to get our new room mate over their fear of rodents and start talking about getting some themselves. We're looking at upgrading the big cage and possibly getting a second one, which it turns out might have to be something that moves up the priority list very quickly.

***********************

An Oops litter is not something I was expecting to have to worry about since we haven't even had a male rat for 8 months and when we did I never let the girls out with him, but I guess that's the thing about oops litters, no one expects them. We moved into a new apartment a few months ago when my best friend moved in with us and we needed more space. This allowed us to rat proof our bedroom so that the girls can come out whenever at least one of us is in there and awake, which was something we've wanted to do for a long time. For 4 months this hasn't been an issue and everything has been great, but I noticed a couple of weeks ago that the girls had gummy candies that I didn't recognise (I wouldn't give them those anyway) in one of their snack hiding spots. I decided either my partner or my roommate must have given them to the girls at some point and got rid of them, deciding to bring up the topic of appropriate animal treats at dinner. A couple of days ago I found more gummies and last night my partner looked up after hearing the girls going nuts in their cage (it was bedtime) and saw a wild rat sitting on top of it. The rat bolted and ran behind a bookshelf and under the radiator, through a brand new hole in the wall by the pipes. We've filled in the hole and blocked off the gap, but just to be safe we looked up the signs of pregnancy in rats.

Bashful, who has very bald nipples, has visibly gained enough weight to look pear shaped, and is frantically building nests and hoarding food, is now set up in the single level cage on her own. We fed her a little scrambled egg and boiled chicken (about a quarter of a cup) this morning and she has two hiding boxes and a mountain of nesting material in the form of paper towels, extra dust-free paper litter, and a few scraps of fabric from a pair of fleece pants that she destroyed once when I left the laundry basket too close to the side of the cage. She was very stressed at first but I guessed that it might be about being separated from her sister, so we put the cages next to each other and both of them settled down pretty quickly. I'm looking in on her a couple of times an hour (being careful not to wake her up if she's asleep) and she seems fine so far. All of the nesting material is in one corner of the cage with the bigger of the two hide boxes flipped upside down on top of it and she's curled up in another corner asleep right now.

I'm a little bit frantic and have no idea what to do from here. I'm worried about her but can't get her into a vet until next week. I've delivered puppies, lambs, and calves before but never something so small and I'm worried I'll mess this up. ANY advice would be welcome!

(also if you read all of this thanks, you're a trooper and deserve an award.)
 
Rats make great mothers. But since the babies will be half wild, they will need a ton of socializing!!! Also, make sure you keep mom happy and comfy. Whatever mom feels, she transfers that to the babies. You really don't want scared half wild rats.
 
You should start weighing any other females you have everyday at the same time each day to see if they are gaining weight. Don't forget to post baby pictures if you can take them secretively without disturbing anyone.
 
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