Wobust Wodent Wheel!

The naked ladies are doing well. They are fitting in well and are a whole lot of fun. We were told when we picked them up that they liked wheels, so we went ahead and bought a Wobust Wodent Wheel. These are apparently the safest wheels and this one is the biggest to our fat-assed boys could give it a go. So far, the naked ladies love it but no boys.

It is a strange sound as the wheel moves and it sounds like horses. We're waiting for dried raisins to get in it and then we can hear them rattle around inside. Not yet, though, but it's only been a week.

Speaking of the boys, I realized that we will have had them with us for a year in June! Boggle has been with us for two years and not sure of the ladies' age.

Fun With Boggle

Felt that we should keep up with this as a blog and not as a "death summary", which it has been doing. Lazy lazy lazy.

On checking out the cage on Tuesday early evening (the rats don't start getting going until about 9-10 pm and like to go to the wee hours), I saw Boggle standing in the cage with mucus/phlegm on her. Took her out and noticed that she was having trouble breathing. I sat with her to watch her and noted that she was heaving a little and spitting up phlegm. She was also swollen around her neck. Of course, at this time, there are no vets open and only the emergency ones. Gave a call to one to see if they had someone who had a clue about rats and respiratory issues and was told that we could come in, they'd give her oxygen and they'd take a look at her. They also shared that this would cost around $185 to walk in the door, nevermind any oxygen or other treatment.

As much as I love Boggle and have never shied away from spending money on the rats - vet visits, tumor removals, spay/neutering, antibiotics, x-rays, euthanasia costs - spending close to two bills to have someone possibly say "yep, she's sick" is not something we could justify. Unfortunately, non-vets like the ratlisters know as much as "real" vets do about rats/exotics. I figured I'd spend most of the night holding her and watching her and then see about the vet in the morning. Luckily it was my day off the next day and husband could wake me up, I'd reassess Boggle and then stay up and take her to the vets or whathaveyou.

At about 6:45 am I got up to take a look at her only to see that the swelling had gone down and she was no longer heaving or bringing up fluid. So far, a number of days later, she is back to her normal self, as that is. We are not too sure what happened - either some kind of injury to her neck or perhaps had an issue with food causing some kind of problem with her swallowing or neck. Rats can't vomit, so maybe she had food stuck. We'll never really know.

We are pleased as heck that it was just a scare and nothing serious as far as we can tell.

Introducing - Gert and Maude - April 25, 2008

Gert and Maude are two hairless albino ladies who look identical. They are crazy, energetic, curious and young.

I had seen them on the rescue website for a few months before we finally picked them up. We were at six, then five rats and we had agreed that once Hilda went we would look into getting them. We didn't want to be over what we believed to be our limit and have the same problems with not being able to give them what we felt was enough attention.

We decided to get them a few weeks before Hilda passed away and brought them home a week before. I didn't want to lose an opportunity to get two ladies like this.

As expected, they are crazy. Hairless rats seem to be a little on the extreme side in terms of personality. Luckily they get along with the other rats - three very mellow neutered boys and Boggle, who is getting on in age and quiet. When we were driving home from picking them up we wondered who would be the alpha rat in the cage. The rats we had now were older and didn't seem to have an alpha rat. I guessed that one of these would take over and it seems that both have. I have seen one try to flip over a boy three times her size with the other riding shotgun. They all get along quite nicely, though, sleeping in hammocks together and no bickering.

As with any rescue, we have no idea how old they are. I believe they are quite young as they are still popcorning a little and quite inquisitive in only the way that a young rat can be. They have apparently been handled quite a lot in their foster home and it shows. They have absolutely no fear, riding around on my shoulder and climbing out of the cage and onto me as soon as I put my arm in.

I'm glad they are here and look forward to many fun times with them. Unfortunately, I don't think I will ever tell them apart!

Gone But Not Forgotten - Hilda - May 3, 2008

Hilda was brought home with Clementine as part of a large rescue. Later on we reunited her with Virginia and Lulu.

Hilda always seemed to be the oldest of the bunch (besides Virginia who wasn't supposed to be with us long) but she outlasted the other three girls and when I talked to the lady at the rescue, she said that there were only a few rats remaining from that particular rescue.

She was a curious, restless girl. When I would take her out of the cage to sit with me, she would be very interested in what was going on elsewhere. She'd try to get on the back of the chair or on the computer table. She would only give me a few moments of attention until she wanted to find out what was "over there".

One thing Hilda was was a fighter. She was already starting to show her age and slow down, but then she got a lump. Then she got another lump on the opposite side. What really determined what we would do was that she also had a hard belly, which was found with a few other girls that we had and it meant that they would be going soon - a major abdominal surgery is not something we would want to put an older rat through even if we found a vet who would do it. She eventually started growing a third lump, but it never grew any bigger than a pea. Hilda was still very much interested in running around and checking things out. We figured we'd keep an eye on her and once she stopped losing her enthusiasm and interest in food, we'd decide what to do.

She hung in quite a bit longer than we thought. We actually believed that Hilda would go before Lulu. When Hilda started to lose weight I started to make a habit of giving her chocolate chips and/or a cashew when we went to sit. I knew she was wearing out when she started sitting with me longer before she'd get wandering. She was still eating though. Eventually, we woke up to find her gone in the cage. She was still doing reasonably well and eating and still getting around. We would look into the cage to check her out only to see her looking back at us as if to say "where's my food????".

We'll miss Hilda, the last of our four ladies. I'll definitely miss her bruxing by my ear on our sits. I will always remember her spirit and her fight.

Gone But Not Forgotten - Lulu - March 24, 2008

Lulu was an extremely beautiful girl who we brought home with Virginia and was part of a group that originally included Clementine and Hilda.

She was quite a lot of fun, always curious and quite the noisy one. She meeped and eeped all the time. When we first brought her home and she started being noisy, we thought one of the other rats were hurting her. We'd go to look and see nothing happening. Either another rat had gone to lie beside her, had walked past her or was just looking at her.

It was a lot of fun to just touch Lulu or put my hand on her and give a very gentle squeeze just to hear her eep. She had the softest fur that I have felt on a rat. Not sure why that was as we didn't do anything special for her in that regard.

She had hurt the ankle joint of her leg and we had taken her to the vet to have it looked at. She had a couple of x-rays done which were very traumatic for her. She cried and we could hear her screaming from the x-ray room. It wasn't broken, but the vet said it could be something like cancer or an infection. We took her home and gave her the antibiotics, but it didn't heal. We figured it was either sprained or it was cancer. She was still doing quite well moving around. Eventually, she started to lose weight and finally she left us.

Lulu has been greatly missed. We have felt the silence (relatively) from the cage and I miss the "they're looking at me" eeps. I'm sure she's giving an earful to someone at the Bridge.