How do you explain this? (Everyone answer please)

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C

Christie

Well-Known Member
Joined
Aug 21, 2008
Messages
652
Location
Hamilton, Ontario
So yesterday I found out that my next door neighbour works in a lab that does research on rodent diets...including rats!! I was excited and went over to the lab (with her permission) and saw this experiment that they were doing and it has been 5 years since the beginning of the experiment. They put 236 rats on a "homemade" diet. Almost exactly what I suggested here: viewtopic.php?f=38&t=6517. But they had Innova senior dog food instead of authority. ALL, yes, ALL the rats are STILL alive and NONE of them have gotton sick and they are all still healthy. Now I'm not trying to e mean but Jorats said that a diet like this would shorten the lifespan of a rat and that Harlan Teklad expands it. Jorats stated that her rats live beyond 3 years. I now think that she is wrong because of this experiment. What do you have to say about this?
 
There is no room for human error in a laboratory setting. Jo didn't state that absolutely, that will shorten your rats' lifespan. she said IN HER RATS she'd noticed that their previous diet was lacking, and since switching to HT, low protein, etc etc, their lifespans had all increased. It was her personal experience based on her own rats and what she'd heard regarding low protein. If your diet works for you, fantastic. Keep feeding it. If published reports come out about this miracle diet that lets rats live 5 years or more, I'm sure people will try it out.

I don't think you meant for it to, but the way you've got that first post written, its reads kind of offensively...
 
WOW. That is amazing.
I would like a lot more info. about those rats, the diet and the research.
What other diets have they tried ... I assume they have comparison diets, otherwise their data isn't very useful.

Do the rats have the normal health problems our pet rats have ....
by that I mean do they have myco?
If those rats live that long on that type of a diet, I can only wonder how much longer they would live if fed HT.

The lives of our pet rats are drastically reduced by myco, the way it lowers the immune system, and the lung damage it seems to cause.
Not to mention heart problems, etc .... (I just had to have a young boy pts as the meds stopped working for his chronic heart failure (chf) .... and I suspect that 2 of my young girls have chf as they are starting to have problems ...)
So I assume that these lab rats do not have the genetic health problems our rats have and that they do not have myco?
 
Also these rats live in a controlled setting, they are not exposed to other rats, or "our" germs. That is fantastic they live to such a grand age. I would love it if all of mine did.
 
I dont think I'm being effensinve. But I shouldnt have said lab rats because they are from breeders and they are treated like pet rats. They have lots of staff so each staff member has about 2-3 cages of rats to look after. They are treated well and are just like our rats. I found that quite amazing.
 
It would be very interesting to know what breeders ...
because if they don't have illnesses like pt, and chf they are not like my rats.
Diet doesn't help the above two illnesses.
 
I'd really be interested in hearing more about this. Could you explain more on how the lab was set up? (e.g. could you go in wearing street clothes? did you have to wear lab designated slippers? was the air HEPA filtered or anything?) Even if they did use breeders they should still know the stock and strain of their animals - Wistar? Sprague Dawleys? Fischers? Or just literally your generic PetSmart rats?

edit: wire or plastic cages? and what type of bedding? I Know a lot of labs use corncob bedding.

Are they going to be doing histological tests or post-mortems on the animals? It would be fascinating if there was an actual organic difference in the bodies of the rats.

I know Harlan is the standard rat chow and will likely remain so in the labs but for individual pet rat owners such a magical elixir would be incredible. Have they published anything? I have access to scientific journal databases, I could look up their papers and send it to people if they are interested.
 
I would like to hear specifics about the study, their diet, living environment etc. Because ANY one of those things can/cannot contribute to the life expectency of a rat. By "breeders" this could mean anything from a reputable breeder who breeds for health and temperment....to someone that just put a male and female together and had babies. :?

I have fed my rats the same type of diet for the last 8+ years. I've had rats who died young from a variety of illnesses, and ones who lived to be 3 years and a little past. I give my rats all that life could offer them, keep their cages spotless and race them to the vet for whatever they need.....yet I hear people talk about their rats living to be 5 years old, while living on cedar bedding, eating commercial petstore mix and living in a hamster cage :rant:

I don't mean to sound skeptical.....I'm just curious about the details of the study.
 
Jorats stated that her rats live beyond 3 years. I now think that she is wrong because of this experiment.
Click to expand...
I certainly didn't lie about my rats living beyond 3 years.

It would be amazing if the rats live to 5 years on dog food and grain mix.
I would like info on this lab as well. I'm sure they are documenting this, I'll let my vet know to be on the lookout for a journal on this subject. Can we get the contact info on this lab so we can get more information?

Did they say what was the basis of their experiment... buy rats from a breeder. (did the breeder know the rats were going to a lab?)
And set them up as pet rats... very unorthodox I would think. But very good for us if we have proof that the diet is actually a good one.
 
rat.charmer said:
I'd really be interested in hearing more about this. Could you explain more on how the lab was set up? (e.g. could you go in wearing street clothes? did you have to wear lab designated slippers? was the air HEPA filtered or anything?) Even if they did use breeders they should still know the stock and strain of their animals - Wistar? Sprague Dawleys? Fischers? Or just literally your generic PetSmart rats?

edit: wire or plastic cages? and what type of bedding? I Know a lot of labs use corncob bedding.

Are they going to be doing histological tests or post-mortems on the animals? It would be fascinating if there was an actual organic difference in the bodies of the rats.

I know Harlan is the standard rat chow and will likely remain so in the labs but for individual pet rat owners such a magical elixir would be incredible. Have they published anything? I have access to scientific journal databases, I could look up their papers and send it to people if they are interested.
Click to expand...

With rat.charmer's scientific background and knowledge, she would be able to interpret to us the data. :joy:
 
jorats said:
rat.charmer said:
I'd really be interested in hearing more about this. Could you explain more on how the lab was set up? (e.g. could you go in wearing street clothes? did you have to wear lab designated slippers? was the air HEPA filtered or anything?) Even if they did use breeders they should still know the stock and strain of their animals - Wistar? Sprague Dawleys? Fischers? Or just literally your generic PetSmart rats?

edit: wire or plastic cages? and what type of bedding? I Know a lot of labs use corncob bedding.

Are they going to be doing histological tests or post-mortems on the animals? It would be fascinating if there was an actual organic difference in the bodies of the rats.

I know Harlan is the standard rat chow and will likely remain so in the labs but for individual pet rat owners such a magical elixir would be incredible. Have they published anything? I have access to scientific journal databases, I could look up their papers and send it to people if they are interested.
Click to expand...

With rat.charmer's scientific background and knowledge, she would be able to interpret to us the data. :joy:
Click to expand...

It would be my pleasure. And if the data comes out and is valid, we should go into the rat diet business! :D Any time I hear of advancements in how we can improve our rats health I get really excited.

Another question: are they fed ad libitum (free feeding) or is their caloric intake individually monitored? Because a reduced calorie diet has been implicated in longevity in many species including the rat. So the magical formula may be as simple as eat less = live longer

(Of course try telling that to a rat!)
 
anyone else skeptical? *raises hand*

i dont think rats have lived up to 5 yrs in a very very long time. with myself and two other friends that have had rats for over 15yrs and combination of over 500 rats i think weve had a handful live more then 3.5yrs and i can recall ONE living to 4yrs. so to have over 200 in one place live more then 5yrs well.........
 
I agree theratlady, this is why getting more info so that we can contact the lab ourselves to find out more details will surely help. I'd like to get my vet to contact them.
 
I'm not meaning to be rude or anything. Is it possible to get more info and have they published anything as I'm genuinely interested?
 
I think there are many diets out there that are decent and that HT is not the end-all be-all for everyone. That's fine. I also have lost rats very young, and have quite a few oldsters between 2 and 3 right now, doing just fine. :) Too many variables involved. Genetics, how they were cared for prior to reaching me, diet, everything...

I personally would love to try a homemade diet for my munchkins but I literally do not have the time/money to put into it, so they will be just fine on their blocks until then. :)

I too would love to hear more info on this research, so we can see if they put the proper controls into place or just lucked out with a bunch of long-lived Sprague-Dawley's. :cheeky:
 
I changed my rats' diet a few times... HT is what I settled with and what seems to work great for my crew. But, I'll definitely switch them up again if something better is found. In fact, I might have to anways. HT may no longer be available to me. So it will be back to the drawing board. Maybe time to look into a completely homemade diet. I just wish I had more time.
 
jorats said:
I changed my rats' diet a few times... HT is what I settled with and what seems to work great for my crew. But, I'll definitely switch them up again if something better is found. In fact, I might have to anways. HT may no longer be available to me. So it will be back to the drawing board. Maybe time to look into a completely homemade diet. I just wish I had more time.
Click to expand...

Why are you losing your HT Jo?
 
woah!! Lots of questions!! Ok, to be honest, I dont know that much about all that techncal stuff but I will ask my neighbour when she gets home soon. And theratlady, why do you think I would lie about this? I'm just repeating about what I heard and saw. If you guys are just gonna laugh and not beleive me then I wont reply anymore. I just wanted some opinions because I couldnt beleive it myself until I saw it. And Jorats, why cant you just feed your rats the 2018? i'm guessing you like 2014 better? Anyways, I'll get you guys the technical stuff sometime tonight or tomorrow.
 

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