Your Challenge If You Wish to Accept It - Help me "Age" Lady

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lilspaz68

lilspaz68

Well-Known Member
Joined
Jul 21, 2007
Messages
24,427
Location
Toronto, Canada, Earth
Lady is confusing me. Sometimes I think she's a little old gal, and other times I think her appearance is fooling me. She runs around a lot, she's very active, very agile, still mostly on her toes, etc. But then Brie was like up to her last week and she was 2 years old, and Lady reminds me of Brie in this respect.

OK I tried to take pics but wow, this girl doesn't stay still :cheeky:

Here you see the little ol' lady potbelly
Ladyandheroldladypotbellyjan3.jpg

Ladysideviewjan3.jpg


The belly up close and personal
Ladybellyjan3.jpg


And then you see her motoring around (I had to put her on the chair to keep her at least in a smaller area :doh:)
Ladywalking2jan3.jpg

Ladywalkingjan3.jpg


Standing
Ladygetsatreatjan3.jpg

Climbing and then sliding
Ladyslidesjan3.jpg


Are we being fooled by those funky eyes? Does that big one make her "look" younger? One small and porphy, looks like an old injury, and the other too big and definitely permanently enlarged (I will watch her eyes carefully)
Ladysfunnyeyesjan3.jpg

Ladyupclosejan3.jpg


However old she is, she's a real adorable full of personality rat :D

Just curious about age guesstimates?
 
I would agree, she seems to fit in age with my Olivia Pearl and Lily about a year and a half and a little older. She's beautiful.
 
I'd say she's over 18 months for sure. I've noticed on my rats once they reach over 18 months and are slim, the bottoms of the feet start to take on a purplish look, it looks more wrinkly too, sometimes you can see a smallish bump on the heal like a callous but not exactly.
You can't really use feet for fat rats cause the bottom seems to age much faster with all that extra weight they carry.
 
I thought bumblefoot was higher up the foot, like more on the ankle than the soles??

Do female rats run more on their toes when they are older, like when they are younger? I've only ever had boys so i don't know anything about females - and all my boys run flat on their feet when they are old

Sorry, i don't really know an age to guess lol. Another question... Can she still see out of that larger eye? It looks a bit cloudy in some of those pics, but i know that could just be the flash
 
The bumps on the feet is normal. Older rats develop bumps on the heal, some can definitely get worse and become bumblefoot but a lot of the times, the older or even fat rats will have bumps on the heal and not get worse.
 
Interesting. I am not able to make a decent guess, but it's good to know about the colour of the feet changing. I will watch mine carefully to see if I can tell the difference in colour between my seniors and younger ones.

Lady is lovely, whatever her age. :heart: And isn't there a saying about a lady never divulging her true age?? :lol:
 
Dewi said:
I'm guessing 2 years old. Does she have rex or something like that in her with the patchy fur?
Click to expand...

I'm leaning towards 2 myself. She has all these visual cues that are misleading. The rexy fur that is thinning, the small porphy eye (makes her look older), the big big eye that makes her look young and babyish, etc, etc.

She's extremely feisty and she will NOT stay on the couch any longer. Why should she? She's got the Floor to Discover now. :cheeky:
 
I dread the time that they discover the counch isnt THAT high and they can get on the floor. The amount of time i've spent chasing rats trying to get them off the floor is ridiculous... but funny :D

I thought she was rex too, or atleast partially. Sid's is supposed to be a full rex, but his fur isnt that curly, and he's all patch now that he is older (like your girl). He only has a few crinkled whiskers too
 
It's very deciving because the visual cues can be used as age indicators AND stress indicators. If the diet was crap she could have thinning fur, if there was a lot of stress she could have a porphy. It's very difficult.
 
Godmother said:
Interesting. I am not able to make a decent guess, but it's good to know about the colour of the feet changing. I will watch mine carefully to see if I can tell the difference in colour between my seniors and younger ones.

Lady is lovely, whatever her age. :heart: And isn't there a saying about a lady never divulging her true age?? :lol:
Click to expand...

"A lady who'll tell you her age will tell you anything." Hah.

So I met Lady - heard she was pinning poor Bess and Sweet Pea all the time and dominating the wheel. How is she with your girls? I definitely learned something today about age and the feet. And I was going to say she's a year and a half.
 

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