here's somthing that might make you happy flappy. scientists have found that rats loved to play hide and seek and even make small squeek when they win. I'm not a big fan of rats but that's really freaking cute!
I know! On top of that, they can laugh!
Fancy rat parents do it with their rats all the time. Before Roman passed away we used to play it all the time with each other. I never heard him squeak tho. If I took too long he’d come and find me.
As another added fact: Rats can be used to parent other animals. There was an animal cafe that did this with kittens whose parents died or abandoned them. They said the rat’s made amazing parents.
My cat was a kitten when she was first brought in who was abandoned by her mom. She had to be separated from the other cats in the house because they kept attacking her. So we kept her in my room where the rats are. The rats were protected in their cage and we kept Peeksies in a baby crib. When we were teaching her how to walk she’d always go to the rat cage. The rats would come and check her out. We’d always steer Peeksies away, then we noticed that Roman, in particular, was using rat motions to say that he wanted to play.
So Peeksies just kinda stood behind the cage and watched. Then she started putting her paw at the cage. She couldn’t get in but Roman could get his face out just enough to groom her. I started freaking out but she wasn’t attacking him. So this kept going on and on top of that she was copying the things the rats would do. Roman tried sharing Cheerios with Peeksies too by kicking them out with his back legs onto the floor with the fill. We’d have to take them because she has Pica and can’t eat any of that.
There was one incident and that was Virgil (my other rat) biting Peeksies on the nose. After that she never got too close to him but would try getting him to play with her.
Peeksies would even sleep next to the cage where they slept at times. Whenever they’d come back from vet visits she’d get super excited about that. She’d wait by the cage for them to back in and then she’d play with Roman.
This went on until the day they both died. After they passed on Peeksies picked up this habit of meowing at the door. This goes on for two or more months. It got worse and worse so finally, I let her out to see what was up. That area outside of my door is a vestibule where we keep the empty rat cage. So she makes her way to the rat cage and the meowing gets super bad. Then she starts rubbing her body on the cage and get’s inside and she keeps looking at me. She smelt them, she was looking for them.
So at this point, I’m bawling my eyes out trying to figure out how to explain to my cat both her dads are dead and aren’t coming back. I still haven’t, but I try and let her know I love her all the time and that her dads loved her and are proud of her and will always be. I know she’s also a cat and these are rats but it’s all I’ve got.
