Training Natals

I am inspired by MouseAgility
Videos of mice and natal rats doing tricks such as fetch and twist. VERY cute! Lucky will be my little pupil since he's much more calm than Cupid right now. How I miss my fuzz butts ♥

Official Mouse Agility Site

Videos of Lucky and Cupid

Pretty short and poor quality (taken on iphone) but it's something :)

OH!

Don't think I ever mentioned...we put smaller wire mesh around the whole rat cage maybe a week ago. Worked out REALLY well. There are a few spots that may still need to be covered for babies but we aren't too worried right now. That was a pain on our fingers! OUCH! No escape attempts because escapes can no longer be made and we did a good job with pointing the wires out and smoothing them so no cut rattie feet. Happy we did it finally....but not looking forward o finishing off the other little bits here and there.

Whatever it takes to have safe caged rats.

Plans...plots...

Thinking about adding a wheel to the rat cage. I think they would enjoy it. I have to be careful though. I've read about tails getting stuck in spokes so I cant just grab any wheel. I also want to string up some bird toys, minus the bells...all I need is to hear bells at 4 am haha

I also need to figure out a good fortune cookie recipe to bake sheets of training treats. They fight over the bits and pieces I hand them and they come running when they think they will get some.

Hamster ball fun?

All snuggled up!

Well...after much mess I think they've got the hamster ball down. At least Lucky does but he's bigger so he's in charge of where it goes.

Because they were afraid of the newness of this ball, they of course did poo and pee while in there. I had to clean the ball up multiple times and pick up what fell out the ball. I also had to wipe the little rats down with a wet towel. They did NOT like that at ALL. I'm guessing they don't like water.

I put them in the ball today while I cleaned out their cage and no huge mess! Lucky and Cupid are getting used to the ball rather quickly. Hopefully they get to the point where I wont have to follow them around with a napkin and a towel haha!

Updated Pic of Lucky and Cupid

Most recent picture I took of Cupid and Lucky. Cupid got BIG! Compare to how small she was next to Lucky in this picture. She is much more easy to handle now. She wants to climb up onto you and explore.

I put them in the bigger rat cage last night and kept an eye on them. Cupid almost escaped again! There is a certain spot where the bars are a bit more open. Good thing I was watching. So until we mesh up the cage they need to stay in the smaller container. To keep them from getting super bored, I got them a big hamster ball they can both play in. Now they can be "loose", explore and exercise without me worrying about escapes.

All in all they are doing well. Curious and cuddly.

Before you assume these rats are hellions....

Many people say they are very aggressive. Consider what age they may have been purchased or what they are being kept for. These rats are bred mainly for snake food. No one plays with them. If you buy an older rat, the aggression will most likely still be set in its little head, making it harder to work with. It isnt used to being petted or picked up.

It's best to buy a few of them when they are still fairly young (but able to eat solids) They will be jumpy as all hell (people have called this area of time the "popcorn stage") but they will be less likely to bite you meaning you will be more likely to work with them. And please buy more than one. They are infinitely more calm when you have at least two.

An other perk of buying them young is you can have them for more time. I've read the average lifespan runs at about 3 years. I want to have mine around me for as long as I can.

In my opinion these make great pets. Small, easy to care for, not smelly, super cute...You just need to put time into them but then again...don't ALL pets require some kind of work and time? ☺