Red Eye (porphyrin)

[dan2333]

One of my rats has porphyrin around his eye. I wipe it but it keeps coming back. He lives with another rat who is the same age.

They fight sometimes but not as much as they used to when they were younger. I read that if rats are stressed out they produce porphyrin and that it's kind of normal.

Maybe the fighting is too stressful for him. But I read that it's normal for rats to play fight.

I don't know what else to do. I keep their cage very clean and they have a healthy diet. I looked up stuff on the internet but there's not really any solutions.

I just posted some pictures of his eye on my blog. Click the link below.

 

[victoria]

Rats normally produce some porphyrin but they are able to get rid of it through normal grooming. When they are sick or stressed, they produce more than they can clean off. Sometimes, rats can go through a period where they can produce excess porph for a short period of time for no reason. One of my girls does this (always from the same eye) for a few days every few months with no explanation.

Keep an eye on him for signs of illness and if he has any take him to a vet. Play fighting should not stress him to the point of causing excessive porph... how serious are the fights? Do they ever break skin or pull out tufts of each others fur?

 

[jorats]

:yeah:
How old are your rats?

 

[dan2333]

:yeah:
How old are your rats?

They are about 8 months old now.

 

[jorats]

Any changes around them lately? Like change the cage or moved the cage to a different location? It is louder than usual, or smoke around the rats?
These things can cause stress and porphyrin to a rat.

 

[dan2333]

Rats normally produce some porphyrin but they are able to get rid of it through normal grooming. When they are sick or stressed, they produce more than they can clean off. Sometimes, rats can go through a period where they can produce excess porph for a short period of time for no reason. One of my girls does this (always from the same eye) for a few days every few months with no explanation.

Keep an eye on him for signs of illness and if he has any take him to a vet. Play fighting should not stress him to the point of causing excessive porph... how serious are the fights? Do they ever break skin or pull out tufts of each others fur?

No the fights aren't that serious. They never cause any physical damage to each other. They just squeek a bit and chase each other, and stare at each other and try to pin each other down.

In fact they used to fight a lot more but as they got older, they started to get along better. You can see a picture of both of them on my blog (their names are Jasper and Theo). Jasper is the brown one and Theo is the white one.

His eye has gotten a bit better I think. I checked it today and it's not as red. I let them run around my room last night so they could have fun and exercise. Maybe that helped.

 

[dan2333]

Any changes around them lately? Like change the cage or moved the cage to a different location? It is louder than usual, or smoke around the rats?
These things can cause stress and porphyrin to a rat.

I thought about that. Their cage is in the dining room next to the kitchen. They are near the heating vent but it's like 2 feet away. I put a container of water near the vent to add moisture into the air in case it was too dry for them.

Then I put the air purifier on near them and left it on all night to clean the air of any pollutants and dirt. I also changed their cage last night.

I think everything will be okay.

 

[dan2333]

I was worried lastnight because when I looked at his eye, it was dark red again and it was kind of wet. So I wiped it again and put an eye drop.

I just checked on him this afternoon and it is not red! I hope it stays that way.

 

[victoria]

Eye drop? What kind? I would be careful about eye drops and making sure they are safe for rats. Porphyrin is a mucus naturally produced by rats - it can be an indication of something being wrong (like when we get congested when we are sick) but there's nothing wrong with it on it's own.

 

[dan2333]

I used Naphcon A. It's for allergies. It didn't hurt him. I think it helped.

 

[victoria]

Something formulated for allergies may mask the symptoms of a respiratory infection without actually helping. If he has porphyrin for no reason the issue is purely cosmetic and nothing needs to be done. If there's an underlying problem, treating the symptoms and not the cause can actually make it far, far worse because you are delaying treatment. That's my two cents.