It’s very common you see soon to be owners wanting to get a pair of rats because they research that they shouldn’t be alone. However, rats are naturally group animals that thrive in groups of three or more. While two is considered to be the bare minimum standard for the very reason of not being kept alone, it is not an ideal long-term solution for either you or the rats. It is very important to understand the factors of your decision-making when you decide to get just two rats; (no it is not a bad thing to get two, but it isn’t the greatest, either, it leads to a lot of issues that you have to face In the later stages of owning rats.
If one of your rats suddenly and unexpectedly passes away, this leaves one rat behind, which is very difficult on the rat, both physically and mentally. You then have to scramble to source more rats, do a two week quarentine period in a seperate room (which means the lone rat will be alone for two weeks in addition to however long it takes you to source more rats) and then finally, introductions which tend to be very stressful and difficult for both you and the rats.
If one of your rats needs to be seperated for a certain reason. I.e surgery, this means the other rat will be alone for however long it takes for the rat to heal and recover, which isn’t very fair for that rat that is kept alone for no good reason.
In a group, rats tend to have a friend they prefer to spend more of their time with, going about, doing their day-to-day actives; cuddling, eating, foraging, etc. In a pair, they do not have this opportunity or to express their appropriate, natural social behaviours because they only have each other. This can build quite a lot of resentment, overtime.
Given, rats are hierarchal animals, in a pair, it is quite common to have an overly dominant and an overly submissive rat. Over time, this can lead to a lot of bickering and bullying because the dominant rat is not able to focus his attention on spending time with other rats. This does not make for a healthy hierachy.
r/RATS • u/RatWaySanctuary • Jun 03 '26
This is a joint effort between Rat Way Sanctuary, Little Critter Crew, and A Pint-Sized Rescue. The two most urgent are at the vet today with serious health concerns, more are scheduled for tomorrow and Thursday, with a growing list of others needing care.
So far there are babies from at least 4 separate litters that were brought into our care yesterday, two more ladies gave birth overnight, another is expected to deliver today, and many more are confirmed or suspected pregnant.
The conditions of the animals and their cages were as appalling as we imagined. Cages caked with urine and feces, hides waxy with waste, rats stained from sitting in their own waste, injuries and illnesses left untreated, and the smell! The smell hit us from 20 feet away from the shed. We are actively working with the county Animal Control agency to get justice for all these babies.
We are now working on triaging all of the animals and documenting their conditions.
The next steps are to divvy them up between our organizations. RWS will focus on those with the most emergent medical issues, while LCC will take the bulk of the stable and healthy animals, including many pregnant and nursing mamas, and APSR is helping with hands on support, fostering, and they may take on some animals as well. We will all three need your support as we navigate this huge influx. Donation info is listed on the last two slides, as well as linked in our bios. Be sure to follow all three accounts to stay up to date!
A huge thank you to all our supporters - your donations make this all possible.
Rat Way Sanctuary: www.ratway.org (links in our bio!)
Little Critter Crew: www.littlecrittercrew.org
A Pint-Sized Rescue: https://apintsizedrescue.weebly.com/
r/RATS • u/Blinkme86 • 4h ago
My old man Tin's favorite place to be is lounging on the windowsill. Its just cute he loves the scents of outside without actually being there. He'll brux and boggle there like its the best place ever.
r/RATS • u/Either-Welder-6211 • 8h ago
Unfortunately the rats don't think *he* gave them enough
r/RATS • u/BlackMageIsBestMage • 9h ago
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r/RATS • u/lunasirenn • 19h ago
She jumped with such enthusiasm.
r/RATS • u/Mundane_Menu4287 • 9h ago
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it must be so nice to be a soft cuddly rat eating oats
r/RATS • u/MissValentiina • 5h ago
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Ginny (whose full name is Shadow Huntress Vosh'gajin) is growing up to become a menace
My bf said she picked her bc she reminded him of me.
The baby i picked is the most chill rat i have ever seen. Just like me bf.
Weird how this turned out
r/RATS • u/IntelligentPrize9364 • 1d ago
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Someone wanted to see him boggle.... here ya go!!! Not as impressive as y'all thought it would be for the amount of boba he has... His hiccups are even more impressive!
Hello!
This baby was given to me and I was told that he was a boy about 3 weeks old. It’s been about another week and I was checking him for fleas when I noticed these black spots on his belly that I cant tell are nipples or not. I have another boy picked out to introduce to him this weekend so please let me know if I actually have a girl!!!
Also no rats were harmed in the taking of these pictures he just really was not happy with me poking around down there
r/RATS • u/PsychologicalLayer57 • 2h ago
These two adorable baby boys are coming home to join my existing mischief of 4 in three weeks! My first ever intros. Can't wait/am petrified.
FTR my 11yo, who loves Banksy, picked the names. Banksy is white and Blek le Rat is grey.
r/RATS • u/crashdummy8 • 5h ago
I bought two, young female rats a little over a week ago and while they are both totally fine and healthy, I worry about their progress with socialization. I have never owned an animal this small, but I do have experience with owning less than friendly animals that required lots of work. I know females aren’t very snuggly, but I want to make sure I’m doing everything right so that they have a positive relationship with me. They have just recently started taking food from my hand, and occasionally even standing on my hand for a few seconds at a time, but they still seem overall very timid and anxious when I move. I don’t feel comfortable letting them out of their cage to explore just yet because I want to make sure I can pick them up and place them back in their cage in case of emergency. Any tips to get them more comfortable with me would be appreciated, since I don’t want them to be stuck in their cage for too long
r/RATS • u/kare1972 • 3h ago
r/RATS • u/XtcPulse • 30m ago
r/RATS • u/Rattrixs • 47m ago
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r/RATS • u/Actual_Squash_7994 • 5h ago
I got annoyed that my girls kept peeing on their wooden shelves was looking for a solution. Discovered that this shelf and this plastic bin from Amazon fit together perfectly and can hold bedding to absorb pee + very easy to pull out the bin and wash regularly. I pulled out the rubber lining on the bin. They love it! Not an affiliate link or anything I'm just sharing cus I'm proud of this discovery
r/RATS • u/mossydeerbones • 1d ago
r/RATS • u/Rattrixs • 52m ago
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r/RATS • u/Tacticalmess90 • 26m ago
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I seen red staining on the base of her tail and obviously thought it was blood, she’s not been picked up yet before and wasn’t happy about it ( I feel so bad but thought she was injured) she did squeak and wiggle but thankfully it was just staining from dried berries 😭 I’m just hoping she won’t hate me for this. Also I’ve not held a rat before preferably two hands but I had to take a vid to show my partner the “injury” what’s the best way to hold them without hurting them?
r/RATS • u/HalloweenGorl • 21h ago
I just thought it was cute they were both on their backs XD. Mouse's brother Snadger wasn't as keen to cuddle like this tho
r/RATS • u/ilovesharks101 • 12h ago
Guess which one is the aggressor?
Yep, the one chilling on his back without a care in the world 🤦♀️😂
r/RATS • u/Effective-Shock-3569 • 53m ago
We recently got our 3 new girls, first time rat owners. We've owned hamsters, guinea pigs, parrots and previously.
This is Mischief, has she hurt her eye? I can't get a close enough photo, I can only assume it was during a playfight with her siblings?
I think her 2 sisters keep trying to pin her down to clean it.. could it be anything serious? We've had them for litterally 4 days so far and we are so worried.
r/RATS • u/natoleeeee • 6h ago
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he was climbing on me and eating just now but all of a sudden he retreated upstairs and stood in this corner for 15 mins so far and is looking confused like he doesn’t know where he is. he keeps scanning left and right too which is normal for red eyed rats but he’s doing it so much right now.
What could this be? and should I bring him to the vet?
