Introducing Rocko~ all 3 boys together pg 8

[hopefloats]

It can go that smoothly. It is awesome when it does. I put Lear with Jackson after Fabian died on the couch for like 20 minutes then put a cage there and that was it, they were cuddling in the cage later. Lear has always been rat aggressive but it was smooth with jackson. I have some intros not even count as intros just move in. Although it usually happens with the girls/boys more so than boys/boys but it can happen. Some rats are just so easy going that they dont care who is around. You have to really know the rats to know how they will go. We all know how the bad intros go but the slow goods ones are best no drama and they almost seem to look forward to seeing the "new" rats again.

 

[Petunia]

just a quick answer for now, gotta take Dre and Norry out for play time
but yeh I think the new boy is considerably younger than I've been told.

he seems under a year old to me. he runs on this toes, almost- I'll see if I can get a video of that, or do you really just need to see the bottom of his feet?

I'd love another opinion on his age.


PS my sister made me a mixed CD of all 80s music, that's what I was playing in the background. I hope I don't get in trouble for copyright infringement again, gah LOL
I stay calmer with music on, that's why there's usually something playing in the back ground

 

[jorats]

I need to see his skin on his toes and heel. So the bottom of his feet. But just the fact that he still walks on his toes puts him very young. I was thinking more along the lines of 10 months old.

 

[SQ]

.... :thumbup:

 

[Petunia]

oh did I jinx it or what!?!?!

actually I waited til too late in the day, I should have gotten them out this morning

but noooooooooo, I waited til everyone was wide awake and eager to get out and run (even though they all had a playtime earlier, these guys like to come out again at night)

so I set up a corner of the rat room for them, with a blanket and this cat scratching pad that the cats dont' like but my rats love

and put the rats inside and as soon as they noticed each other, we had a 3 rat rat ball
fur flying like crazy

they all have very small slashes on their backs (I dont think they are bites, I'll get a closer look in a bit)

I know you're supposed to end on an up note but it was obvious they were not going to calm down in that setting so I got the table top in the rat room set up with a blanket and some food, and put them up there.

Very interesting what happened next: New boy (ack I know still no name!) instead of walking all over Norry like he did yeserday morning, today he slowly approached, Norry glared at him, and even reared up a bit at one point, but new boy stuck his nose UNDER Norry this time.
I think Norry is letting him know he's not going to give up his stop at the top.

New boy has almost no experience with other rats so I'm impressed that he seems to be picking things up pretty quickly

however the room full of scents is a bit too much for all of them so we are, as I suspected, going to have to go slow and do a bit at a time. They have so much territory and so many toys! I have a feeling they are going to go thru each one individually and lay claim one at a time. This could take forever :roll: :lol:

I do have one question- well more than one but I'm too tired to list the rest :lol:

main question is, all 3 boys come running to ME when they are scared or nervous etc
what am I supposed to do, kind a gently push them away?
stay so far away from the table they can't reach me?
but then once we are in the play area, they all come and climb up me (dre tucked himself into my shirt LOL new boy tried to take my shirt off and Norry climbed up and got under my chin)

they are ALL mumma's boys :laugh4: :heart: :heart: :heart:

I think that's super sweet but I do need them to work things out so they can all live together.
so what do I do when they come to me?

 

[jorats]

Their reaction is very typical. Good that you went back to tabletop but in a couple of days, try again.

At this point, you can stay around and be their comfort zone unless you notice that you might be a trigger to their fighting.

 

[Petunia]

ok thanks for the feedback!!
no I don't appear to be a trigger at all, but once they've come to me, they just kinda cling on and dont' want to move.
it seems it will take forever for them to work things out if they spend the entire session glued to me LOL
it's sweet, and I love the loving... well maybe today they'll be a bit braver, seeing that nothing bad happened last night (I mean after that initial rat ball)

 

[hopefloats]

I have had rats that would sit on me during intro and it still helped them. They grew used to allowing the other rat on my lap with them which is part of the battle. Some of my rats had such a hard time with intros just stressed them out they would only deal well if they had access to me. MY daughter and I would let the scared ones sit near us to keep them calm and the others just joined in.

 

[dspch911]

Possibly the best use ever of an oven mitt...wish I'd thought of that.

I agree !!! :emb: Why didn't we think of that?
Glad your intros seem to be going well. Ours went all wrong when we moved to the rat room and gave them all that floor space. Guess we should of thought about smaller sections.

 

[Petunia]

well you know what they say, if it seems too good to be true, it probably is LOL

I can now see that at least some of the bruxing is from stress, it's that awful grinding noise, not the pleasant little crunchy noise when they are happy, and there was some boggling as well, along with the nervous bruxing, so!
now we know, boggling is not always a happy contented thing.

although at times I thought maybe they had mixed feelings :lol:
is that possible?
like, they are stressed cuz now they have to work out the ranking but happy to have new buddies?

it also appears that Norry is a reluctant alpha. He started to face off with Jinx a few times when Jinx was getting too rough with his grooming, and it looked like Jinx understood that Norry is boss-
for instance Jinx would shove his head under Norry and lay next to him and his keep his head down or under Norry

but then Jinx walked over Norry's head like he did yesterday, peeing on him, and Norry did not object.
I think Norry is a wishy washy alpha and maybe not so sure its worth the trouble- it seems like he might let Jinx take over....

I don't know if they even think like this :giggle:
It seems Jinx is still learning the proper way to behave around the alpha and either Norry is being super patient with him, or Norry's not 100% committed to being top gun.

I got slime'd with the most disgusting fear poop from Jinx, that was interesting :roll: :sick2:

otherwise a pretty uneventful 4th intro session

 

[dspch911]

So new guy has a name!? Curley and Finn did a lot of stress boggling at the end especially when we gave meds.... Popper did some while do intros w/Sebastion (that is on going)

 

[jorats]

Jinx is alpha and claiming it. When he puts his head under Norry, that's being dominant. Peeing on Norry, that's dominant. He's waiting for Norry to accept that and become submissive. So this needs to occur during familiar ground. The reason you get the rat ball on familiar ground is because that's when Norry decided to claim the space. So really, he's sending out mixed messages. On the table Jinx is boss but on the ground, not so much.

 

[Petunia]

Jinx is alpha and claiming it. When he puts his head under Norry, that's being dominant. Peeing on Norry, that's dominant. He's waiting for Norry to accept that and become submissive. So this needs to occur during familiar ground. The reason you get the rat ball on familiar ground is because that's when Norry decided to claim the space. So really, he's sending out mixed messages. On the table Jinx is boss but on the ground, not so much.

oh! OK, so I really need to get them on the floor. Oh joy. :roll: :lol:

how do you end up on a up note if there's a rat ball and someone gets hurt? this is where I get confused, because if someone is getting hurt, you have to break them up, right?
so there's no way that session will end well.

do you wait for everyone to calm down and put them all back together?

On the table top, Jinx will go and eat, and Dre did a little snacking too, but Norry is just frozen in place with his eyes all squinty. He doesn't move around much.



on the floor, they were immediately on each other. Jinx and Norry first, then I think it was Jinx and Dre and then Dre and Norry- it happened so fast I 'm not sure of the order only that it was Jinx and Norry first. it was like one of those pin ball machines, one thing bouncing off another thing, setting off the next thing....
It would have been funny if they weren't all ready to kill each other!

 

[jorats]

After a rat ball, have some awesome snack ready like cheezies or something of high value, when you separate the rat ball, count to three, give the snack, and end it. Or if you see they are not going after each other, keep it going and end it when you feel it's long enough. It might be just 5 minutes in the beginning at which point, doing another table top would be great. So the next day, 10 minutes on the floor and another 30 minute on table top... and so on.

 

[Petunia]

oh thank you so much for the detailed instructions!

I had everyone out on the table in the morning and not much happened. Dre did eat some of the veggies and so did new boy who has yet another name- Fritz.
Poor boy!! Luckily I still mostly say Buddy when I talk to him, I haven't worked on teaching him a name, I'm still in the phase of trying to find a name that fits. So for today we call him Fritz LOL

sorry for the confusion this may be causing.

OK so we did table top yesterday morning and I let them on the floor in a small area last night.

there weren't any major scuffles, mostly some warning moves between Norry and New Guy, in each case New Guy either retreated or Norry climbed up me.

For most of the time, New Guy was wandering around eating up all the honey nut cheerios!! and Norry and Dre were either on my lap, shoulder, or in my arms.

Frankly it was just so nice to cuddle with them,I held them for nearly an hour before putting everyone back.

I'll do the short floor session and then table top today after my eye appt, I gotta run in fact

thanks so much for all the help!!!!!!!

 

[jorats]

It's going well!

 

[Petunia]

i had an appt yesterday and didn't get them out til later in the day

by then I'd forgotten that it was floor first, and then table top, so I did the reverse. :roll:

everyone was fine on the table, but as soon as they were all on the floor, New Guy went ballistic and jumped the boyz.
None of these three are interested in treats at these times and I risk getting bit offering them so I just split it up and put Norry and Dre back
and New Guy wanted to be held for a bit before I put him back.

ok fast forward to later on, I got Norry and Dre out and let them have a good long play session, about an hour (after the first half hour they often just hunker down to nap or hang out in the blankets)

then I put them back and let New Guy have 2 1/2 hrs total: in the play area for an hour and then the whole room for the rest of the time


so, they should have all been tuckered out right?

I put the three of them in the smaller floor area and right away, New Guy jumps on Norry, as soon as I break that up, its Dre and New Guy going at it (happens so fast I do not know who jumped who first)

:gaah: :gaah: :gaah: :gaah:
they wouldn't take a treat so I put them on the table with a box open on both ends, basically more like a small tunnel affair so that I could see and easily reach them all-
and they all go in there and just sit

for a very long time. Or so it seemed, by then I was exhausted :lol:

they do nothing on the table, but as soon as they are on the floor, it's like they turn into firecrackers

I have been switching them out of the cages, Norry and Dre get to go in the smaller cage while New Guy is in their cage, and vice versa

they all seem pretty content to do that, except that New Guy is NOT happy with the small cage, he really wants as much room as he can get to run around. He has a LOT of energy.

any suggestions on how I should proceed?

is it really ok for the boys to see each other out in the play area when its not their turn? they arent building up resentments or something?

 

[jorats]

Are there any cuts and bites after they jump each other?
Are you quick enough to put up a wall in between them? The wall being your oven mitt? for example, when you see New Guy about the jump Norry or Dre, put your mitt in front of him like a wall and sweep him in the opposite direction with the mitt. You would need to do this each time he lunges for the siamese twins.

 

[Petunia]

the very first time out on the floor, each one of them ended up with a small wound, most look more like small slices but one could be a little bite. all scabbed up and very small, I check each day for swelling etc but seems to be healing well.

what I've been doing now is letting Dre and Norry cling to their mumma LOL so that's what they do for most of the time. I can't put Dre and Norry on the floor with New Guy, I have to hold them. If they are on the floor when I add the new guy, he puffs up immediately and goes for them
I did push him back with a tshirt but then he lunged and bit my shirt sleeve til he'd calmed down.

by then Norry and Dre were snuggled up safe on me.


that was yesterday. Today I let Norry and Dre have the whole play area first and let New Guy watch and boy does that bother him LOL he was puffed up and doing that pawing that they do to leave their scent, you know? OH he was in Norry and Dre's cage at the time, he started out in his own cage but he was climbing the walls wanting out so I let him have the bigger cage.
he spent a lot of time puffed out and marking things and trying to reach out of the cage. Finally after maybe a half hour or more, he calmed down and went and ate.

When Norry and Dre were showing signs of being bored, I took them and put them in his cage, and then took New guy out and let him run, as soon as new guy was out, I put Norry and Dre back in their own cage. I can't handle the three all at once, New guy is not easy to hold, when he wants something he claws and squirms like crazy lol

so i have to do things in stages

so, New Guy had a long long time out and then I made a very very small pen, goT all three of them and held my boyz on my lap while New Guy checked out the area and got ticked off because he couldn't get out
he sniffed NOrry and Dre several times but didn't come up on my lap right away
he nipped at Dre's face and Dre got down for a little while but got scared and jumped back on my lap.

a couple of times New guy tried to go at the boys by coming up behind my shirt from behind me but I picked him up and moved him

and when he puffed up and started to climb up on me all puffy, i picked him off and sat him on the floor. He started out puffy and got puffier, otherwise I would have let him keep going to see if he backed off or got less puffy.
each time he approached the boys on my lap, if he was a bit puffy and calmed down i praised him and if he approached them and sniffed them and stayed calm i praised him, well, all of them really (good boy good boys, etc) I have found he needs me to talk very slowly but firmly- in the past I"ve had good results wiht hushed words repeated frequently (it's ok, you're ok, is what i've used in the past with rats) but he likes fewer words said with more confidence and slower.
This kinda of makes sense, as his two moms used few words, and spoke slowly. guess that's what he's used to. I tend to be a chatter box LOL
also probably explains why he doesn't have any reaction to the name they gave him I dont think they talked to him the way I talk to all my rats. I give htem a running commentary of what i'm doing or whats' on tv etc etc LOL
hey I live alone! i gotta talk to someone


so back to the floor session- New Guy spent a lot of time sniffing my other two, and that went ok. New Guy was puffed up at first, but the longer he sniffed them, the calmer he got.

he was on my lap with them and didn't try to bite or nip them, and only power groomed them each a tiny bit, then sat there just looking all pleased with himself so I figured that was a good time to end it

whew!
its going to take a long time, I think for these guys to work things out. I am seriously considering getting new guy de- balled
he seems way too territorial to me.
he does that paw patting thing and climbs over things to pee on them and just seems to be saying MINE MINE MINE MINE!!

Norry and Dre are sweet gentle guys, I think the new fella is a bit too much for them the way he is now

if he's really past puberty, shouldn't he be less hormonal and calmer?

oh he did nip at my hand when it was curled up inside my sleeve. he's never done anything more than that but he has gotten over stimulated a few times and nipped lightly.

 

[jorats]

Ya, a neuter would be good for him. I've had 2 year old rats be hormonal and bullies so no, they don't become calmer with age. Some do, but many don't.