Thinking about getting a couple of pet rats - do they smell?

[smallfurryfriends]

I am doing some research into getting a pet. I would like to get one in the summer, just before my DDs 4th birthday. I am really drawn to rats as have had some friends who have had them as pets and I think they are really lovely, good fun and affectionate. I also like the fact that you can toilet train them and teach them tricks. I have done a bit of online research and gather they need company and that they like to be housed in a part of the house that has a lot of action. I am thinking of putting them in my living room. My concern is how much they smell. Are they smelly or do you not really notice it so much?

They can do. You do have to keep on top of swapping out the litter trays and doing poo picks. There isn't much you can do about wee unfortunately. My girls pee all over the hammocks constantly. My boys just wait until they are out and pee on DP
By day 7 ours do smell noticeably but its clean out day so its fine. We can leave them up to 9 days with just daily poo pick ups but prefer not to obviously!

I love my mischief, I have 6 in three cages! I would say go for a trio from a good breeder, I wish we'd started with three boys. We tried to introduce a baby to them last year and our alpha was having none of it, baby wasn't suited to being with other rats either tbh and he's a lone boy now. But we have three girls together and I love the dynamic between them. It also means that if one dies we're not left panicking trying to find another rat to keep the leftover one company.

I'd ditto getting three and with my boys they got pongy after 4 days - a pee smell. Easily remedied by regular clean outs. Enjoy, they are fabulous

I wouldn't say they are odour free but they aren't stinky like mice.
They are lovely pets. Good to handle (unlike whizzy gerbils). Not nocturnal (like hamsters).

I didn't find mine smelled any more than any other small caged animal tbh.
Good choice,I'd say!

They can smell but I once visited someone who had bathed hers since they were babies. They loved their bath time and smelt lovely.

Apparently girls don't smell quite as much (I only ever had boys) but they are more susceptible to tumours.

Girls smell less than boys, but girls are more skittish. Boys turn into big fat lumps that like stroking and scritching.

I kept rats for a long time. They are fab pets but they do definitely pong in my opinion, especially boys. But boys are more affectionate.

One thing you can do re smell of wee is check the hammocks daily too. We change ours if they've really gone for it but changing hammocks too much can lead to them just peeing even more. My big boys fart and that stinks. My little boy just smells generally but he's an ill little lad with a buck grease problem, its not an awful smell, just a generic smell, as silly as that sounds!

I wish I could get mine to like water. There's a bloodbath every time we do bath time in my house and its not the rats who get injured regular baths can cause overproduction of buck grease apparently so if you have greasey boys it could be counterproductive to bathe them. I haven't really tested that theory though given the aforementioned bloodbath!

Going against the grain here, my big boys are actually really antisocial! My baby boy is a runt and extremely cuddly for it, my girls are hyper, but they are so sweet and love cuddles as much as they love running around. My big boys are from one of the original nfrs breeders whilst my two younger girls and baby boy are from a very family friendly nfrs breeder who is bloody awesome, i call her quite often for advice!

Call around vets before you get your rats op. If you can find a rodentologist you'd be very lucky but make sure that you ask questions about rats and about what they'd recommend for typical rat illnesses. A lot of vets aren't great with rats and they are prone to upper respiratory issues. Two of mine will be on and off of medication for life as they are pretty bad and if it werent for my brilliant rodentologist I think that they'd be dying slowly but surely if not dead already. Her colleagues are hit and miss though.

If you live anywhere near South Essex, there is a guinea pig and rat rescue with a resident rodentologist. They are based in Hadleigh or Eastwood I think.
When all my boys died I donated all my ratty gear to them. They are lovely and would be a great place to find some new pets.

rattieofcaten I had a boy that had fits everyday! Getting med into a rattie is interesting until you get the hang of it isn't it?

Crazy: if you could let me know the details of the guys in south Essex please? I'm in Brighton but we're regularly in Essex to visit family with the rats and I'm not happy with the vets I've been in contact with!

My little seizuring runt isn't the one we need meds for funnily, because they seem to be triggered by his growth spurts and aren't too long we decided to hold of on medicating him until he's a bit older and hopefully they'll stabilise themselves. Its my big boys who need medicating, they have Yuri issues constantly. We think that a they reacted badly to some bedding shortly after we got them and having been expecting some snuffles And porphyrin because it was all new and stressful we didn't clock on soon enough and their lungs were damaged :( they then got swapped into something that they were very allergic too and then became allergic to care fresh eventually too so yeah, they're on fleece these days! Not fun medicating. We use peanut butter! Its the only way to get it into them!

Peanut butter is the only thing I found worked with mine too! Fussy little critters...
I'll double check exactly what they are called, it's been a couple of years since I last had my boys, but the are on Facebook as well as having a website. The rodentologist lady works in a vets in Eastwood. I'll try and get some details, or at least a link!

Rattie sent you a PM

Thanks! Much appreciated :) peanut butter is brilliant for doing meds! We had a vet tell us to put metacam or baytril into our boy's water after he had his eye out and just was not letting us syringe it in, which meant separating him from his brother too. He refused to drink it. After three days of having not drunk a thing we spoke to the rodentologist who told us to put him back with his brother asap and use ribena or anything else to mix the meds with just to get it into him. Have not gone back to syringing since!

God knows how we'd get it into ashi, our runt, if we needed too, he has no bloody appetite most of the time and the only treat he likes is yoggies. Git! He's gorgeous though. He's my heart rat really, he's out at the moment keeping me company as I'm home sick and he's not very well this week either, poor sod. He's had a growth spurt so is really lethargic and having seizures and penis plugs this week.