how do you "punish" your rats?

[melissa0125]

Hello, my rat Bella has been starting fights a lot lately. Noone has gotten hurt (thank god) but its really annoying and Im sooo scared that someone WILL get hurt.
How do you "punish" your rats for being bad?
Any suggestions of how to stop this?
I dont want to separate them because Bella is best friends with Juliet... But Juliet is bestfriends with Shadow (who is the one Bella normally starts the fights with).
I hope that made since haha.

 

[jorats]

You should think of it in another way... Bella is stressed out and having a hard time dealing with it and because of it, she starts little fights with her buddies. this would be the time for you to take her out and have some one on one interactions, get her out of the cage where she's getting overly stressed, talk to her gently. Keep doing this each time.

Also... don't forget that those fights might actually be playing. And fighting can happen more often when the girls are in heat.

 

[melissa0125]

thanks! i really never thought of it that way. I will definitely try that next time

 

[vivianelizabeth]

Uggghhhh. Evita was in heat tonight and was being SUCH a jerk to frida....

I don't usually 'punish' my rats, just reward them for being good.

So while Evita was biting and mounting Frida, I removed evita, picked up frida, and let her run around my desk while I wrote my paper (conveiniantly ABOUT Fria Kahlo [human frida not rat frida]) meanwhile evita stayed in the cage.

 

[jorats]

They sure get funny when in heat. Thats all gone once you get them spayed.

 

She may be in heat!
Also how big is their cage?

 

[Sorraia]

I don't "punish" my rats. Instead, if there is an issue, I try to figure out why there's an issue and fix it. If some rats seem to not be getting along, I'll try splitting the group into a couple different cages (they can come out to play together if they get along during play time, sometimes rats just can't *live* together), or get them a bigger cage, more toys, more food bowls or water bottles, etc.