Hi, I am new to this forum but I think it is the right place :thumbup:
Ok, so about 3-4 weeks ago I bought a 6 month old rat (Maxie) to keep my current 6 month old one (Rue) happy. I got Maxie from a breeder who is very nice. He was going to give her to us for free :shock: but we gave him £10 or we would of felt bad. After a week of putting them in the bath together, I Maxie and Rue in the same cage and after a bit of dominance fighting they got on with each other, in fact right now they are sleeping together in their blue igloo
But behind Maxie's cute face she is a bit of a bitey rat. On the first week, I got her out fine with no biting but a little bit of hiding. That was to get her in the bath with Rue but afterwards I went in the bath with her and she lay down in between my legs (near my crotch which was a little bit weird but cute all the same) and she let me stroke her as she bruxed and boggled which I thought was great. On the second week things got a bit more hard, I had to chase her around loads until I could pick her up and then on one day she decided to bite when I tried picking her up which broke the skin. And then things just got worse and worse until I just didn't try to pick her up. In the last couple of weeks I have tried many things (gloves, luring her into a travel cage ect) but now I try luring her up my arm until she is fully on it and I take her away. That has only happened once, but she did not bite in the bath again and bruxed (this was 3 days ago). She now does not trust me to go on my arm fully though.
But today something nasty happened. I put my hand in the cage, Rue went up to it expecting food but there wasn't any and she walked away. But Maxie went up to my hand and literally plunged her teeth into my hand (the bit between my thumb and forefinger) until I snatched my hand away (this bite went in so deep, about 2-3 mm) and I didn't have time to squeak to show her it was the wrong thing because it was oozing with blood and very painful
anic: . I washed it, dis infected and put a plaster on it and all of that. I was so ashamed and hurt (mentally and physically) it made me leak a tear :sad3: I called the breeder and told him about this and all he said was to either take her back and swap her (I do not want to do this as I think progress can be made) or pick her up with very thick gloves which is practically impossible considering she runs forever. He also said it is probably territorial but said no solution other than the two options. I am partly thinking about taking her back, but I do love her. Also, Maxie is unlikely to be pregnant because Rue is a girl (there was great confusion when buying Rue from the pet shop though, in fact I bought 2 but the other one died shortly after she was pregnant which was acutally the reason why we found out they were both females because the shop guy said they were males. I hate pets at home now though.) although as explained they said she was a male. She has no testicles though I am pretty sure no penis.
Anyway, I haven't put my hand in the cage since and I am scared to because the bite was the worst I ever had (the pet store one who died, Rita (Flushed away reference
bit me a couple of times because she was super territorial) although I know its silly to be scared. It is so frustrating :wallbang: .If you made it this far, thanks, and also (as you can probably tell) I really need help here on what to do.
They're cage is a savic one (153 cm tall) and is lifted off the ground and is extremely heavy so I can only push it. That means no putting it on surfaces and luring her onto a table.
Well my hands are pretty tired now but thanks for reading and thanks in advance for helping :3
-RageSaul (Jonathan)
