Melissa's ZOO
Well-Known Member
So, since Lilly's passing I was able to open up the FN so that my remaining 7 could be one big happy family (Sunflower tormented Lilly so I had to separate the old from the young).
Dolly my lonely little Petsmart rescue (who took months of intro since she had ZERO rat skills) finally settled in with her family of 4 raging girlies and seemed to be happy sleeping with everyone and even on the odd occasion letting someone groom her, which was a huge accomplishment since she would go out of her way to draw blood when first intro-ing.
Anyways now that I have opened the cage up to everyone Dolly is sleeping all alone at the bottom while everyone else is in a happy little rat pile way up top. Even during out time she goes to her little place and stays there (she has a stash off HT in an office chair) pretty much the entire time and when someone comes near her she has gone back to doing the angry cat tail swishing and grabbing Sunflower and Pumpkins ears again.
She hates, I mean hates being touched by me so I pretty much leave her alone and let her be a rat. She will come see me when she wants and will sometimes just sit on my shoulder looking around and trying to grab my eyelashes. OUCH!
So my question is should I go back to having the cage separate or leave it be and she will adjust? I wonder if she just prefers to have the option of joining the family ruckus or being alone. I know that I enjoy my alone time more than most people and get pretty angry when it is interrupted, so maybe she is just like me. Any thoughts would be appreciated.
Oh and her is a recent picture of my confused girlie.
Dolly my lonely little Petsmart rescue (who took months of intro since she had ZERO rat skills) finally settled in with her family of 4 raging girlies and seemed to be happy sleeping with everyone and even on the odd occasion letting someone groom her, which was a huge accomplishment since she would go out of her way to draw blood when first intro-ing.
Anyways now that I have opened the cage up to everyone Dolly is sleeping all alone at the bottom while everyone else is in a happy little rat pile way up top. Even during out time she goes to her little place and stays there (she has a stash off HT in an office chair) pretty much the entire time and when someone comes near her she has gone back to doing the angry cat tail swishing and grabbing Sunflower and Pumpkins ears again.
She hates, I mean hates being touched by me so I pretty much leave her alone and let her be a rat. She will come see me when she wants and will sometimes just sit on my shoulder looking around and trying to grab my eyelashes. OUCH!
So my question is should I go back to having the cage separate or leave it be and she will adjust? I wonder if she just prefers to have the option of joining the family ruckus or being alone. I know that I enjoy my alone time more than most people and get pretty angry when it is interrupted, so maybe she is just like me. Any thoughts would be appreciated.
Oh and her is a recent picture of my confused girlie.