play area troubles...advice needed!

[SookieObiRonny&Bear]

I have four rats, and I know that it's good for them to have at least an hour of time out of their cage every day. In the past, I would simply let them run around my room. However this proved to be problematic, as they would chew through my bedding, curtains, and the clothes and bags in my closet. My closet (very small, only room for a clothing rack and a shelf) currently has no doors, so the rats can and go in and out as they please, climbing up my clothes and into the bags. Recently I've tried using the small playpen shown in the attached photo, which I made for them a year ago. It worked then because Sookie and Bear were very small. But now with four full grown rats its hard to control them, and they will often jump onto the rim of the playpen and run away. The rats are used to being able to have free range of my room, but I really can't have them chewing everything and it's hard to keep track of four at one time. The playpen is only as tall as a little over my knees, and I'm around 5'6". It's probably about big enough to fit 3 upright critter nation cages in it. I also don't have a separate room I can use as a play area for the rats. I'm not sure what to do, but if anyone has any advice or information of how they organize a play area for their rats, I would be very grateful. If there are any purchasable playpens that people know of, that would be helpful too.
Thanks from Sookie, Obi, Ronny, Bear and me!

 

[RattoPazzo]

Hi, sorry in advance for my poor spelling

You could try to make a higer play pen out of cardboard boxes. I made mine out of ikea cardbord. if you go to the end section where you take the furniture there usually are big sheets of pakeging cardboard that thay use to separate the boxes. those get usually tossed away but if you are patient you can fined a good number to make a very durable wall. I've had mine for a year now and it has endured several attacks

 

[SookieObiRonny&Bear]

Hi, sorry in advance for my poor spelling

You could try to make a higer play pen out of cardboard boxes. I made mine out of ikea cardbord. if you go to the end section where you take the furniture there usually are big sheets of pakeging cardboard that thay use to separate the boxes. those get usually tossed away but if you are patient you can fined a good number to make a very durable wall. I've had mine for a year now and it has endured several attacks

Thank you so much! I will definitely look into that. I had been thinking about making a cardboard playpen but wasn't sure where to find enough/the right cardboard.