First time rat owner

[victoria]

You haven't done anything wrong. Taking care of rats well is not easy and we've all learned since getting rats for the first time. Your boy is lucky they ended up with you and you are trying to help him. Here's an article from Rat Guide about colorectal polyps:

http://ratguide.com/health/digestive/co ... polyps.php

It seems like it's more likely as a rat ages, I'm honestly surprised it would occur to a rat this young.

In the future, there are many rescues dedicated to just rescuing rats, as well as shelters that accept and adopt them out. Sites like Petfinder allow you to search for adoptable rats in your area and many rescues will transport quite a ways to get rats to a good home. The North Alliston and District Humane Society is one shelter that isn't too far from you (not much further than Hamilton anyway) and I know for a fact they often have rats available. The shelter I volunteer has transferred several rats there, including many healthy babies. I'm sure the local Guelph shelter often has rats available as well.

 

[crumbilina]

Which vet did you see in Guelph?

I used to live there and went through all of them until I finally found my vet in kitchener. I currently live in Hamilton and will drive my rats to kitchener when they need vet care. IF you are able to get him there, I would recommend it.
In kitchener its Mitchell Animal Hospital on gage street. The vet is Dr. Gerald.
He is a great vet, he works with you and he knows his stuff... PLUS he is open to learning more.

I hope your little guy gets better!

Now you know for next time about the rescues etc. My first rats were from a pet store and while I feel like I was naive and stupid for getting them there, I don't regret it for a second. They were 2 wonderful girls. I had no idea about the rescue community and all that is out there (kijiji, craigslist, SPCA, humane society, etc, etc - I didnt even realize that the humane society accepted rats! And I had done a tonne of research on their care, so it really should have come up). IF I was to go to a pet store and get a rat now? Well, I think i would deserve a swift kick in the butt with a pointy shoe because I now know about the rescue community... Try not to beat yourself up too much, you didn't know... but now you do for next time

Out of curiosity though, do you remember the road that the breeder lived on in Hamilton?

 

[brooklyn]

I saw Dr Erin Harrison at Campus Estates. It was mostly an emergency thing, I've heard Dr. Gerald is good, but I can't get to Kitchener in a pinch. I dont drive. And the breeder lived on Glancaster Road on the outskirts of Hamilton.

I'm at home now with Atticus he's sleeping against my chest. I gave him his pain medication and he gets his third dose of his anti-inflammatory in about two hours. I cleaned out his hospice cage, and he pooped today, still in diarrhea form, but at least I know he's not all clogged up and his bowels are still working. And there was a significant amount less blood in his poop than yesterday. I hope he'll be feeling much better in a few days. I've extensively been looking up anything else that it could possibly be in case the vet got it wrong, but nothing has come up other than polyps.

 

[raindrop]

I commend you for your efforts. This forum is all about learning from mistakes and having the supportive help. Your main concern is getting the little guy well. Keep trying and hope to see improvements. It really does help having a good vet that knows their stuff. Unfortunately we did have many in our city.

Ann

 

[brooklyn]

I'm wondering if there's a way to get him to gain some weight? I've been giving him soy milk, as the article on polyps says soy and tofu are good for him and luckily, I happen to drink soy milk anyway. I feed him it in a syringe and he really seems to like it. (I've been supplementing the other boys with this too, though they're bigger, they're still babies, and they also seem to really like it) But I've also noticed he's started to eat his poop, which I know means he's trying to get back some of the nutrients he missed out on, so I'm wondering if maybe I should be giving him a vitamin supplement or something? The vet suggested that I watch him and his brothers to make sure they're not rough housing him too hard as he's already in some pain and she doesn't want him really stressed, and that if they start picking on him, to separate them. The night I took him to the vet, he stayed in his hospice cage for the night, just so I could see in the morning how much he pooped and how much blood came out, I saw no blood so I put him back with his brothers because I don't want him to be lonely. But if they start picking on him, should I maybe put him in his hospice cage for the day so he has unlimited access to food and water without any competition from his brothers and isnt getting roughed around? Also should I maybe soften his lab blocks a bit?

He's fussy with his medicine, and as he's so small it's hard to force feed him since his mouth is so tiny. But masking it with a quarter teaspoon of pumpkin purée mixed with banana baby food and dripping his medicine on it seems to work. Thank you victoria for the pumpkin purée idea, he really seems to like it and he was definitely passing his poop a lot easier last night. I got more money today so I can take him to a follow up appointment with the vet, and invest in some soy baby formula for him.

Thankfully my mom understands how much they mean to me, and though she isn't the biggest fan of rats as pets, she gets that they're still pets and they're still living creatures and they need to be properly taken care of. Especially since they're babies. She treats her dogs like they're her children, I swear to God they are the most well taken care of dogs I've ever seen, they even have their own heated and air conditioned trailer to hang out in. If it weren't for the fact that she gets it, I wouldn't be able to take care of Atticus. So many people just pass rats off as being rodents and some how the fact that they're rodents makes people think they're disposable.

I've had so many kids at my school say to me, "You spent 150 dollars in two days on a RAT? You could buy a colony of rats for that much money." Which is so insensitive and upsetting to me, because I look at them and they're not just rats. They're these tiny little baby animals that depend on me completely to take care of them, they're my responsibility.

For years I wanted a rat, but when I lived with my mom, she wasn't comfortable having one in the house, and then for years I wasn't allowed to have a pet because I was told I wouldn't take care of it. When my best friend abandoned his guinea pigs and moved to Alberta, I took care of them for a month at his mom's house until I found a new home for them, yet I still wasn't allowed to have a pet, and now I have three. And I'm trying so hard to take care of them properly, I don't want them to be unhappy, and I dont want them to be in pain. In a way, I am trying to prove to my family that I can have responsibilities, but more so I want to prove to my rats that I care about them and love them. It's very overwhelming to get my very first pets and have one of them be so little and sick, and so scary and heart wrenching when I saw him bleeding.

I'm sorry, I'm rambling, I just feel like I need as much help as I can get, and the best way to do that is to explain my whole situation with these little guys.

 

[victoria]

To put on weight, you can try offering foods with healthy fats. Avocado may upset the stomach so I wouldn't give that to him, although for most other cases it would be great.

Baby cereal is a lot cheaper than baby formula and should work just as well. Baby formula is more energy dense but it may be too rich for him.

White cooked pasta, pureed veggies like sweet potato, carrot, turnips (or veggie baby food but making it yourself is cheaper), a little yogurt (not the low fat kind), pureed veggie soups. You can add a bit of coconut milk or olive oil to those to increase the fat content. I don't know if meat products are a good idea right now (like baby foods with meat) because they are harder to digest and we don't know what's wrong with him for sure.

Edit:

I forgot to mention, soaking lab blocks in soy milk is a great idea. If you're feeding Oxbow I find grinding them first is best because they may run off with soggy blocks to all corners of the cage but it would work regardless.

If the pumpkin puree helped, Oxbow makes a digestive enzyme supplement called Papaya Fruit Plus. It's more for bunnies than anything else, it helps prevent issues often caused when rabbits ingest too much fur. I use it for my bunnies and it does wonders for them, I've never tried it with rats though. If want to try them, PM me your address and I can send you a few. You would only need to give him 1/4 tablet or less, you may need to mix in in soft food. (My rabbits think they're treats and often bite me they're so excited to get one.)

 

[brooklyn]

The baby food at the grocery store near my house is very cheap, so I'll try that. I use Harlan 2018, but I can crush those too. And thank you, I'll pm you right now.

 

[victoria]

You won't need to crush Harlan, it breaks down when wet. I actually suggest you don't try, I killed a spice grinder that way

 

[EDK]

You're a trooper for hanging in there for your little baby, keep hanging in there, I'm sure things will improve

 

[brooklyn]

Atticus went to the vet again today for a follow up appointment. Yesterday he started bleeding again from his bum, I just held him and fed him water and Pedialyte from a syringe, and let him have some baby food, I gave him his pain killers and then he slept on me for about two hours last night. And I also started to notice his brother Kiedis was starting to sniffle, so I called the vet and made an appointment for both of them. The vet checked Atticus over, and noticed his toe has started to get a little bit infected, so she put him on some antibiotics that will help with that, and she gave him some vitamin K to help with blood loss. But some good news, the blood that has been coming out isn't frank blood, it's clotting which is indicative of some healing, AND the little guy gained 4 grams! Which I know isn't a lot, but considering I brought him on Wednesday night and he was 49 grams, so in a period of about 90 hours, he went up to 53 grams, I'm sort of happy, I'm going to keep trying to get healthy fats into him, and I have bought a couple jars of baby food for him, that he's been enjoying, and I'm gonna keep giving all three of them lab blocks soaked in soy milk, and Atticus gets between 5 and 10ml of soy milk from a syringe daily, depending on how much he'll drink. Kiedis got a brief exam, where he was weighed and Dr. Erin just listened to his chest and then prescribed zithromax. (which is funny, because I have mild asthma, and am prone to respiratory infections just like these little guys, and I get prescribed the same stuff that they do, mines just in pill form ) But now, I've come home to my Memphis sneezing a bit, which is unnerving, though it was directly after I cleaned out their cage, so maybe that's it? I have absolutely no more money until the 15th of November, my mom has sent 350 dollars to me in the past five days for these little guys, and I have had to spend it all. The first vet bill was 136, the second was 154, the carrier I had to get was 30, and the other forty has gone to getting purées and baby cereal and soy milk and another water bottle for their carrier and several dish cloths to clean Atticus with, since my grandmother was not impressed with me using our dish cloths to wipe poop off of a rat. God, I'm so overwhelmed.

Edit: Kiedis weighed 115 grams. I really see what you mean by Atticus is small even for a small rat. I imagine my other boy weighs about the same as Kiedis does, if not a little bit more, Memphis is a little more bulky than Kiedis who's sort of sleek.

 

[jorats]

Rats are costly vet wise. It always burns me when I see stores advertise rats as a cheap easy pet.
Sending healing vibes for your little one.

 

[Pluie]

Many healing vibes for your two little boys. Its definitely not easy, and not every family member can understand what we go through, but at the rat shack, we do. May your little darlings get well soon.

 

[brooklyn]

I never figured they'd be cheap, I just wasn't expecting to have to do all this in the first two weeks of getting them. I figured I'd have a bit of time to save up some money before they got really sick. Kiedis' respiratory infection wasn't too costly which surprised me, but I'm just hoping the littlest one gets better. I'm spending as much time as I can with him, and feeding him. I just want him to pull through this, because I know I can give him a good life if he does.

 

[EDK]

I never figured they'd be cheap, I just wasn't expecting to have to do all this in the first two weeks of getting them. I figured I'd have a bit of time to save up some money before they got really sick. Kiedis' respiratory infection wasn't too costly which surprised me, but I'm just hoping the littlest one gets better. I'm spending as much time as I can with him, and feeding him. I just want him to pull through this, because I know I can give him a good life if he does.

Oh trust me... I know exactly what you're going through. After going 6yrs of not having rats after my last boy died, I bought Gizmo and Techno. Techno was about 6weeks when I got him, from a petstore where he was in a crowded cage of 20 other males of various sizes, from his size to fully grown (horrible conditions). Third day I noticed a problem, he had a servere URI, and we battled it out physically and emotionally with guidance and emotional support with the Rat Shack and going from one vet to another, for over 3 long weeks, using antibiotics to Nebulization thearpy. All these spendings were coming out of my inheiretence...I don't want to know the full total of how much I spent trying to save him...but if I could, it'd be over a grand. Sadly...his URI turned to phenmonia, he stopped eating, stopped grooming, stopped drinking, he lost a termendous ammount of weight and he sound terrible. My alpha boy, Gizmo, who I still have today, was a big loyal brother by his side the whole time, but even he was getting stressed from Techno's suffering...so I had to make the choice...and end his suffering, despite all we did, me, my vet, and all the support from people here at the Rat Shack.

Techno's Memorial Vid
[BBvideo 450,375:3js47gsl]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AGgM7yiLBig&list=UUSS1-HnnHWZ_wIO-9hVfxWQ&index=28&feature=plpp_video[/BBvideo:3js47gsl]

These days I occassionally see the vet at the first sign of a flare up, heck I just got back from an appointment today with my other boy Gyro. He tends to have rapid sneezing outbursts off and on, last week it sounded more aggressive so I went to get him checked out. My vet said other then for a little phory or red gunk and the sneezing, he's in very good shape, lungs are strong, heart rate awsome, but to be on the safe side we're putting him on some doxy.

I wanna smack the people who say rats are cheap pets. LIES ALL LIES :redhot: they are no worse vetbill wise then a cat or dog! It's hard to deal with at times when these little guys when they are sick...but trust me and everyone else when we say, it's always worth it to see them happy. Because they make us happy too :thumbup: I have high hopes for your little baby, keep it up, you're doing everything right :hugs: