Introducing a 1 year old to a 3 month old

[shelllfish]

Im trying to introduce 1 year old Waffles to 3 month old Chowder. Ive gotten past the keeping them in seperate cages to get used to eachothers smell. Now Im onto phase two. I put them in a new cage, neither of them have been in before. At first Waffles let chowder run all over him while he sat there really freaked out. He didnt make any noise or move just let Chowder check him out. I put waffles little house in the cage and chowders been going in it while waffles is trying to relax and get away from him. Waffles is not to happy about this now. Theyve been boxing eachother, waffles is pinning down the younger one and holdin ghim there. And then after a minute of that he goes back to his house and starts sqeaking . Im really worried Waffles is going to have a rat heartattack or kill the baby. Any suggestions? Is this normal? this is my first introduction, ive only had solitary rats before.

 

[Chevalrose]

I've only intro'd babies to older males...but the rule of thumb is to leave them be if there's no bloody fights.

Sometimes rats just squeal more than others...Onyx squeals at everything. When I was intro-ing him to my older boys I thought they were killing him LoL.

 

[smilez_n_hugs]

Maybe I missed it or you didnt add it but you did bathtub/neutral area intros before you put them in a cage right?

 

[shelllfish]

Yeah, I had them on the floor in my bedroom and they seemed fine. Waffles didnt really understand what was going on since its been a year since he's seen another rat, let alone a hyper baby rat.
Im going to keep them in seperate cages for another few days and keep putting them in the big cage for a few hours a day, but im going to supervise them i suppose.
Do the fights escalate quickly or do they just seem like they are playing around at first? It looks like they are playing right now I was just curious if thats how it starts out
Thanks guys

 

[jorats]

Keep doing what you are doing, it looks like it's coming along well. If there's no direct attacks or aggression, I'd say it's going good.
Let the big guy pin the young one, he needs to learn the big guy is the boss. 3 months is a good age to do intros.

 

[shelllfish]

Thanks so much. I was initally freaking out about them meeting. I think everything should be alright. Ill post on how its going or if i need some more help/ moral support. haha

 

[Moon]

I have to say, I LOVE their names. Mmmm waffles and chowder...

 

[shelllfish]

So the boys have been together the past few hours and Waffles ( the older one) at first was pinning Chowder down and almost biting him. Now he seems to have given up and has retired to his wooden house. He looks terrible though. He looks depressed ( if a rat could be). is this normal..? Is he just tired from the little one running all over him?

 

[jorats]

He must be quite annoyed with the little one. Give them time... they need to adjust to each other.