ShadowTheRat

This weeks adorable rat paw paintings by my sweet ratty girls - they all did such a great job!

Cracker practicing some tissue box fetch! Fetching a tissue is a bit difficult for rats because the texture and grip is so different than our other fetch items - but once they figure it out then they can fetch just about anything, so its a great skill to work on. Great job Cracker!

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Want help with training your rats tricks? I have a rat training book available here! https://www.etsy.com/listing/1605480026/the-ultimate-guide-to-rat-training

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Crumb is working on combining agility obstacles with fetch! Crumb loves both agility and fetch, so this is a fun combo for her and she's really coming along with getting it down - go Crumb!

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Want help with training your rats tricks? I have a rat training book available here! https://www.etsy.com/listing/1605480026/the-ultimate-guide-to-rat-training

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A brief overview of Chickpea's 1st 2 sessions learning ring toss! Chickpea started out pretty unsure of biting the rings, but by the end of session 1 she was confidently moving them, and by session 2 she started to get down the whole ring toss idea! Still a bit of accuracy work to go, but she's doing great!

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Want help with training your rats tricks? I have a rat training book available here! https://www.etsy.com/listing/1605480026/the-ultimate-guide-to-rat-training

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Cracker is learning one of my favorite tricks, that being the "rob" a purse trick! Right now she still wants to stash the real dollars lol, so for now we are working with a paper substitute :P

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Want help with training your rats tricks? I have a rat training book available here! https://www.etsy.com/listing/1605480026/the-ultimate-guide-to-rat-training

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This week’s paw paintings by my talented rats - all the rats did an amazing job!

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Crumb is learning to stack cups! From a rat who originally refused to pick up any items other than her beloved wiffle ball, this is great progress and shows how well she's gotten fetch down. Of course she still needs to work on her aim, but one step at a time - great job Crumb!

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Want help with training your rats tricks? I have a rat training book available here! https://www.etsy.com/listing/1605480026/the-ultimate-guide-to-rat-training

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My sweet Pistachio is gone 😞After months with cabergoline slowing her rapidly growing tumors, and after several tumors removals, she just got to the point where the tumors were starting to overwhelm her and were decreasing her quality of life, and I had to let her go for her own sake. I’ve never seen a rat so tumor prone like poor Pistachio was - we struggled for the last year+ at controlling them, but she seemed to pop up a new one every other week and for every one that we removed or managed to stop growth with cabergoline, another would rapidly take its place. I never understood just how awful mammary tumors could be in rats before - I’ve mainly had female rats for the last 12 years, but Pistachio is my first to develop multiple tumors rapidly, and I wouldn’t wish that fate on anyone 💔

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Pistachio was always a bit of a challenging rat, because unlike her siblings she never really developed a lot of confidence. From day one she didn’t mind handling or touch, but just about everything else terrified her. She was scared of open spaces, scared of sudden movements, noises, and really anything new.

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And for a while I didn’t really bond with Pistachio, because she really only wanted to hide. She would explore her cage and seemed confident enough there, but even then it was hard to get her to approach for longer than it took to snatch a treat. And outside the cage she was incredibly nervous - she would hide for much of free-range, only daring to come out for a few minutes when the other rats were eating snacks (she was INCREDIBLY treat motivated, which definitely helped).

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And all of these sound like negative things, but really this was just her personality and I respected that. While I did always take Pistachio out to free range with her cagemates, I never forced her to come out into the open. If she wanted to join in then that was great, but I always left it up to her.

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And little by little she gained confidence, with most of it coming from seeing the other rats interact with me and their environment. She saw them train with me, and as a result also wanted to train - and like many of my skittish rats this was a big way I connected with her, because she came to view training as very predictable and fun, and it was one way she always enjoyed interacting with me. She also saw my other girls play and cuddle and run all over me, and little by little started doing the same. It got to the point that as Pistachio crossed a year old, you could nearly always find her in my lap or jacket, because she felt very safe there and would dash back to those places if she ever got spooked.

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During these past few months, I saw the biggest change yet in Pistachio, and she really started to seem comfortable in her own skin. She started to explore confidently, not dashing off at every noise but instead investigating with curiosity! She happily climbed to the top of the rat climbing wall several times per free-range session, and was often the first to investigate new boxes and toys. She no longer cringed back from sudden movements, sometimes darting off for a second but quickly coming back fully ready to engage and investigate. She seemed to be coming into her own, and I was so very happy to see such a positive change in her.

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And in a way that’s what makes her passing hurt most, because I feel like Pistachio only just started living her best life, and yet it was taken away from her just as suddenly 🙁I so wanted Pistachio to have another half year or even year+ of good life - she only got a bit under 2 years, and I wish so much that she had more time.

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Cracker working on her ring toss trick! This time I challenged her with an extra tiny red ring - she was a bit confused, but tried her best and figured it out (even though she may have possibly pulled all the rings off once or twice lol)

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Want help with training your rats tricks? I have a rat training book available here! https://www.etsy.com/listing/1605480026/the-ultimate-guide-to-rat-training

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Another fun DIY I recently did - this cage is in my play area and I needed a way to access the top part without turning the whole thing. So I used a pair of cooling racks from Target ($6 each) and zip tied them on to create "hinges". Then I used a double-hook tension spring to keep them closed (which I mainly do to prevent the rats from climbing on top of the cage). Its a bit difficult doing it one-handed but for a super simple and quick solution I'm very happy with the results!

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