Hi. So one of my ratties has recently been showing old signs of age all of a sudden. He's only just over 2 years old, but when I adopted him at 9 months he already had a respiratory problem and it has affected him his whole life, so he's always been on antibiotics for that. The RD obviously doesn't help his deterioration.
Recently he's lost a lot of weight. I took him to the vets for a checkup a couple weeks ago and he gave him a good check-over and said there's nothing else they can do, just told me to monitor his quality of life. However now I'm worried he's not really eating anything. I've started spoon-feeding him baby food, and he's also had porridge every evening- i have to separate my other 2 rats from him whilst he eats because he eats very very slowly, almost just sort of licks everything? What's weird is, after he's eaten (and he doesn't eat much) he will go for the closest thing to him and start frantically chewing on it? Fleece bedding, or cardboard boxes, whatever he is next to he will chew on for a good few minutes, almost like something is irritating him? Does this seem to ring any alarm bells to anyone or is it just some weird old-age habit?
I'm going to phone the vets again tomorrow and book him for another appointment, to get his teeth a proper check over etc. But just wondering if anyone has any other advice in the meantime... I'm really worried about him, and worrying his quality of life really isn't that great anymore... Thankyou.
Recently he's lost a lot of weight. I took him to the vets for a checkup a couple weeks ago and he gave him a good check-over and said there's nothing else they can do, just told me to monitor his quality of life. However now I'm worried he's not really eating anything. I've started spoon-feeding him baby food, and he's also had porridge every evening- i have to separate my other 2 rats from him whilst he eats because he eats very very slowly, almost just sort of licks everything? What's weird is, after he's eaten (and he doesn't eat much) he will go for the closest thing to him and start frantically chewing on it? Fleece bedding, or cardboard boxes, whatever he is next to he will chew on for a good few minutes, almost like something is irritating him? Does this seem to ring any alarm bells to anyone or is it just some weird old-age habit?
I'm going to phone the vets again tomorrow and book him for another appointment, to get his teeth a proper check over etc. But just wondering if anyone has any other advice in the meantime... I'm really worried about him, and worrying his quality of life really isn't that great anymore... Thankyou.