Rat bullies brother relentlessly

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Monkeydoodles

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My wife and I are new to rat ownership, and are having an issue with our two boy rats, Merry and Pippin (6 months old). The background is as follows. We adopted our rats a little over two weeks ago from a shelter specializing in rodents. They are two from a large batch of former lab rats.

The issue arose after several days in their new home. Merry and Pippin would get into altercations involving a lot of squeaking. Being new rat owners we didn't recognize it for what it was. We had read that rats will engage in good-natured 'wrestling' and assumed that this is what they were doing. However, the situation has since escalated. The wrestling has devolved into outright chases, with long whiny squeaking from Pippin. Whenever Pippin leaves his chosen shelter (a sputnik), Merry will find him and they will have a little nose-off. Without fail, Pippin will turn tail and run, with Merry in hot pursuit. Pippin will retreat to his shelter, and if he cannot, Merry will clinch Pippin in a rat-ball. Even when Pippin makes it to his shelter, sometimes Merry will force his way in and fight Pippin.

We are very worried for Pippin at this point. He is missing tufts of fur and he has a little wound at the end of his tail. He cowers in his shelter all day. From taking Pippin out of the cage to play we have come to know him as an active little rascal who loves to explore and cuddle. It's a stark contrast with his behavior in the cage. I cannot let Pippin live out his life this way.

It seems like Cain and Abel would've been a more appropriate pair of names...

Does anyone have any advice?

Thank you for reading
 
We’re they housed together before you got them ? It could be that one may be getting to territorial over the cage. I would suggest maybe getting a larger cage if you haven’t already and try to clean and rearrange things in the cage to help make him less territorial. If they weren’t housed together before you got them he may just be a very dominant rat and you may have to split them up if you feel they are in danger however I would try to avoid this. Hope this helps a bit
 
Thank you for your advice! Yes, they were have been housed together their entire lives. We had conferred with the staff of the shelter about the size of the cage. Eventually we settled on this cage: Savic Zeno 3 Empire The size is: 100 x 50 x 116 cm. Is that size sufficient in your experience?

Oh, and yes, to protect Pippin, I have split them up on occasion. Only for several hours at the time, though.
 
That size should be fine for rats I always think the bigger the better and make sure it’s got a lot of toys in there for them. As they are males they can fight with each other my two male rats used to play fight a lot however if your rat got a injury from it I would be cautious with them and keep a close eye on them if you can if things escalate you may have to consider separation but as they have been together all their lives ideally you want to try not to separate them. Maybe get in touch with the rescue center you got them from and see if they have had any experience of this between them before.
 
That's a great suggestion. I've been in contact with the rescue center about the fighting. They claimed that any fighting that doesn't draw blood is acceptable, but we are beyond that now. They were open to having us switch one of the rats out. We have considered taking them up on their offer, but we wanted to see if other rat owners had any good advice before we did so.

Is castration an option? I find conflicting information online. Some claim it's an acceptable way of calming down the aggressor, but others claim the impact is negligible and the castration poses an unacceptable risk the rat's health
 
I personally wouldn’t get them castrated as there can be issues during the procedure such as them possibly not waking up I wouldn’t take that risk I would keep a close eye for a few more days but as they are causing injury to the other rat I think separation may be something to consider.
 
Rodentsaregreat said:
I personally wouldn’t get them castrated as there can be issues during the procedure such as them possibly not waking up I wouldn’t take that risk I would keep a close eye for a few more days but as they are causing injury to the other rat I think separation may be something to consider.
Click to expand...

What would separation look like? Different cages? Do I need to get them extra buddies?
 
Separation would be putting them in separate cages you may be able to house another rat with the less dominant one however I maybe wouldn’t house the dominant one with another rat and see how he does on his own
 
I would personally recommend getting Merry neutered. Yes there are plenty of risks but 99 percent of the time getting a rat neutered turns out successful. If you still don't want to go that route, you can try re-introducing them with high supervision or get an older, gentler male rat Pippin can look up to when Merry gets on his nerves. Senior rats, anywhere between a year and two years, are quite cuddly. There are plenty of places where you can adopt a male rat that is neutered.
 
YES, neutering, NOT castration, can and will help provided the rat is still young enough that the hormones are not yet permanently stored in the brain, so to speak. I've had this happen several times, but only once did i have to permanently separate them. Unfortunately it does happen. The only other thing I can think of is to ADD more rats, preferably big ones or 1 yr olds, not old, not young, and Hopefully that will put Me Tough Guy in his place. Good luck
 
mwp051699 said:
YES, neutering, NOT castration, can and will help provided the rat is still young enough that the hormones are not yet permanently stored in the brain, so to speak. I've had this happen several times, but only once did i have to permanently separate them. Unfortunately it does happen. The only other thing I can think of is to ADD more rats, preferably big ones or 1 yr olds, not old, not young, and Hopefully that will put Me Tough Guy in his place. Good luck
Click to expand...

Thank you for the advice, guys. I have been to the vet with Merry and we have had him neutered (excuse my English, its not my first language). He's still recovering, but seems to be doing well. The situation in the cage is still tense, with the occasional scuffle (accompanied with lots of squeaking), but the chasing has stopped for now. We'll have to wait and see how the situation develops. Pippin doesn't seem interested in messing with Merry, but Merry is immediately squeaks and gets on his hind legs if Pippin comes close. I'm putting this down to him feeling vulnerable, still being in recovery and all. We will post an update in a while, when everything has settled a bit.

Your help is much appreciated
 

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