Didn't even know I had lost a rat!!!

[Pixie]

I was getting ready to give my boyfriend a haircut, setting up in the kitchen when I saw something move out of the corner of my eye. I turned and saw the back end of a rat run behing my dog food bins.

Nothing too perculiar about that, happens almost daily around here when I have hoppers in my rat colony which is also in my kitchen. Everything is setup in a corner and the dog food bins are right next to the desk where the rats are. When the little buggers get out, I always find them somewhere in that corner: behind or in the desk somewhere, in the baseboard heater or in the vicinity of the dog food bins and bowls.

What puzzled me is that I only have three possible culprits, one young adult female rat and two very small hoppers that just opened their eyes. All of these are brown and white and the rat I saw scurry away was beige! I look in on my rats and sure enough, everyone is accounted for!?

Me and my boyfriend try to catch the bugger but he's really quick!!! He gets away from us and scurries under the stove. We remove the bottom drawer to see if we can catch the rat through there and find the little bugger's nest!!! In one of the pans there was a pile of "fluff" and other things to make a nest and a whole pile of dog food!!! LOL He was all set up!

We finally caught him and he was really wild! I didn't want to put him back with the others so I just did him in and froze him for a future meal. The thing is, this guy has been loose and living in my kitchen out of view for some time now, at least 3 weeks!!! He's almost the same size as my young adult female rat which is a keeper from my first litter quite a while back! I still don't understand how I could have missed him as I count each litter and keep a good eye on the critters especially the adventurous ones since I've discoved their escapades. And on top of it, him not being seen by anyone during that time, neither my boyfriend or myself nor the 2 dogs!!! Clever little rat!

Oh well, I'm happy he was found and didn't wind up at the neighbors! Yikes!!! I'm definitely revizing my colony setup to avoid these guys from being able to get out altogether!!!

Pixie

[SCReptiles]

i am producing about 500 a month, i often loose a few. =)

[gonesnakee]

Maybe you didn't lose it. maybe you gained a wild one without knowing? Mark I.

[Lisa]

We used to have that problem with mice when we used to keep them in the hamster cages until we started putting them in tanks. What was happening was the hopper mice were squeezing through the bars. drove us nuts, specially when we took the hoppers and put them in their own cage and they'd mysteriously appear back with their parents (I was sure katey was trying to drive me nuts and she was probably thinking the same thing about me).

A rule of thumb is if the head fits through everything else does too. so if you can push the head through your cage will hold the rodent just as well as it will hold water.


We've only lost one rat and she leaped out of our hands when we were socialising her. (not all rats are marked for death)