Just been through my old phones pictures and I was only going to upload the cutest ones but they're all so cute. I'll try not to break the board with lots of pictures I'm going to do it a bit at a time as there are a LOT of photos.

Firstly, Epic Cage! This is the cage I kept them all in when I had 9 girls. It's a jenny cage with a smaller cage on top of it. The rats also got free roam of the room when I got home


Sploink! She's a beautiful dark eyed russian blue dumbo rex. She was really nervous up until recently but she's such a sweet little rat now. She doesn't like having new rats in her cage (To the point of attacking them) but she's ok outside of her cage. I'm hoping to breed her with my male husky at some point in the next few weeks





Peace
Akai-Chan

Next! Baldy. This girl is so very sweet. She's a red eyed dumbo double rex. Probably amongst the blues as she is the sister of Sploink and Skeeks. She's a very sweet girl, always wants to come out and cuddle and licks EVERYTHING. She lost her eye very early on in her life due to an eye infection. Doesn't affect her too much, all she does now is walk round with her head tilted to the right and occasionally runs into things





(Skeeks is Baldy and Sploinks sister. Can't find many photos of her at the moment so I'll write about her later)

Boyrat! Boyrat is my most recent addition. He is my only male rats and lives on his own (But he spendsmost of his time riding round on my shoulder). He's a black eyed husky dumbo and is such a sweet, active little guy. He always wants to play and when he's done playing he just curls up and falls asleep on me

Skurrik Furrik and Skrp! These are now my boyfriends rats but they used to be part of the big group. These girls are top eared agoutis and 2 of them are rexes. They generally stuck together and didn't much play with the other girls but played amongst themselves a lot

Klai and Sydik. These 2 have a bit of a story behind them, especially Syd. They are sisters and I saw them advertised on gumtree last year as the owner 'could not look after them anymore'. I called her up and said I'd like to take them and her exact words were 'They're horrible vicious little things. They were so small and cute when I got them but now they've just turned nasty.' I got my mother to pick them up for me (I was in Nottingham at the time and the lady lived very close to my mother in London) and mum then dropped them to me in Cambridge. She rang me beforehand saying that I have no chance with them and I might aswell take them and get them put down. I can see why she said that.

The first time I saw and smelled this cage I nearly vomited I swear. The shelves (Which were supposed to be green) were brown. Covered in possibly months worth of poo and pee. the hammock they had in there stank, there wasn't a food bowl and the inside of the water bottle was green. When I empited it out, what little water left in there was yellow. The bottom tray was a disgrace. The wood shavings clearly hadn't been changed for months, in some places it was so saturated that the shavings were actually floating slightly. Again, it was covered in poo too. The bars which should have been silver were brown and stank.

Then I looked at the rats. Klai was not as bad as Syd, but still quite bad. Both had respiratory infection and were thin. Klai had lost some fur, but Syd had lost all her fur. I could see every bone in her body sticking through. I don't know how she survived. She had a very bad respiratory infection, a mites infestation and had huge cuts on her shoulders (from scratching) + deep wound in her leg (Which I believe she had chewed there). Out of boredom she had started chewing the bars of the cage which had made huge sores in her mouth. Her teeth and nails were overgrown and she was terrifed of humans. If anyone came within, say, 4 feet of the cage she would throw herself at the side and lunge until they were gone. Before she got to me, she had bitten 7 people and drawn blood. Klai had bitten 3.

First thing I did shen I got home was set up the quarantine cage and made a vet appointment for the afternoon. After much squealing biting and running around with a towel, we got Syd and Klai into the quarantine cage and proceeded to clean out their big cage. I retched so much emptying out the bottom of the cage. I cleaned it in a bathful of diluted bleach, and just putting the shelves in there turned it brown. I had to refill the bath several times. Once everything was washed off I put them in the bath again and then sprayed them with cage cleaner to be safe. The outside of the cage took hours, even with the help of a pressure hose it took around 5 hours to make it clean. My lovely boyfriend finished cleaning it while I took the girls to the vets (gardening gloves in tow).

The vet looked at them and her first question was 'Are yuo sure you don't want me to put them down?' I said No, because I thought that, no matter how bad a state they were in, these girls had a fighting chance. They had gone on this long, I might aswell give them the chance to let them live. I got baytril for their respiratory infections, a different anti inflammatory for the Syd for the sores and cuts/hole in her leg and shampoo for the mites. The vet also filed down their teeth (more biting ensued) and recommended bathing Syd in antiseptic solution and salvon cream.

So I did. I got them home, bathed Syd in antiseptic and used the mite shampoo then used savlon on the wounds. Spiked their water with baytrill and made them up some weaning food as they couldn't eat solid food properly.

End of week 1. The mites and respiratory infections have gone. Syd's mouth sores are going slowly and her wounds are healing up. She has a very small fuzz on her body as her fur starts to grow back. She's still vicious and will have your hand if you put it anywhere near her, and she doesn't respond to human voices. However I found she did respond to singing. If I was cleaning my room or something I would usually sing and she would instantly prick up her ears and run to the side of the cage. Klai was getting used to beaing handled, but still bit sometimes but didn't draw blood. She would just test between fingers and food. They were both gaining weight very rapidly, Syd's bones weren't so sticky out through her skin and Only Klai's spine stuck out slightly now.

End of week 3. All of Klai's fur has grown back. It's clumpy in places but it;'s there. She's turned ito a great little rat, bruxing all the time and massively friendly. She only bites now if I stick my hand in her house while she's asleep but I can't blame her. She's gained a lot of weight and no longer has any bones sticking through
Syd's wounds have healed up almost completely. Her bones only stick through slightly now and she happily eats solid food as opposed to the cream/bread/cereal concoction I made for her before. Once she's out of the cage she doesn't bite, but if you put your hand in her cage you're asking to be bitten.

End of week 6. You'd think that nothing ever happened to them. They've been successfully integrated with my other 6 rats and play quite happily with eachother. Klai is full of energy and always wants to come out of the cage for a play and a run round. She's quite a kissy cuddly rat and is forever running over me.
Syd is a bit quieter and more reserved. She comes out of the cage occasionally and when she doesn she doesn't run around and play much, just cuddles into my neck and bruxes a lot when I stroke her. She doesn't bite anymore (Though she does nip if I touch her where the hol;e in her leg used to be). She's a skinny rat and doesn't eat much but she's grown a beautiful white rex coat. She really is a pleasure to own

KLAI






SYD
(On the right)





Unfortunately, a few weeks ago Syd passed away. I found her in her cage, with only a faint heartbeat. I attempted to resucitate her, succeeded and called the vet who said to take her in in the monring. I spent all night syringe feeding her but I think that lack of oxygen or something similar had affected her mobility as she couldn't seem to move her back legs and couldn't move along the ground very well. She fought well all night long and I held her for hours between me and the radiator to keep her warm. I sang to her like I used to when I first got her and she seemed to sit and listen to me. She passed away with me holding her at 5am, about 4 hours after i resucitated her. She will be sorely missed. She gave me so many months of joy, I'm so glad I didn't give up on her like so many people told me to when I first got her.

Peace
Akai-Chan

well done you! You really did well with them both. Sorry to hear about Sydik, but at least her last months where good one with you xx

Awwwww, great pics

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Thankyou both very much

Right nearly done now...

Skeeks! Sister to Sploink and Baldy, she is a red eye powder blue rex dumbo. Like Sploink, she's pretty nervous, but she seems to prefer women to men (She's much calmer when I handle her than when my OH handles her)





Last but not least,
Sky! Sky was one of 3 rats I got from pets at home (grrr). They sold her at 4 weeks old, but said she was 9 weeks. She couldn't eat solids, but before I realised this both her sisters had died (within a week of getting them no less). I fed Sky weaning food and she pulled through for another few months but refused to eat solid food and didn't make it in the end. After being rejected by my big group of girls,. she lived out her last few weeks with Boyrat (He got rejected by my old group of males) and died a few weeks ago

pretty ratties
i do miss keeping them

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Very very lastly, some group pictures I found that made me giggle



(Warming up on the radiator after a bath
(My housemate the day I covered him in rats)
(And again)

(Not realising there's another new water bottle downstairs in the cage!)





Hope you enjoy!

Peace
Akai-Chan

Whyever did you stop? I don't think I could stop keeping them to be honest. My mum made me stop keeping them when I lived with her and I couldn't keep them again until I moved in with my boyfriend and it was horrible I love watching them play, they always cheer me up.

Peace
Akai-Chan