Kitty and Maya - How to Entertain a Rat

nahatalie

Since I haven't been on in a while and I love talking about my rats, I thought I would share with you a few funny moments I have had with my two rat girls and you can try with your small animals!

Hang a long towel on the back of a door - Maya loves this to climb up! But be careful, when they get to top they are not too sure what to do so supervision is required to help them down again.

Blow in your rats face - Kitty stands on her hind legs and tries to catch the air coming from your mouth! It looks as if she is clapping! The harder I blow, the faster she claps! (if she didn't like it, she is more than free to run away, she loves this for some reason!)

Trail a pen across the floor and watch your rat hop, skip and jump after it. Kitty and Maya can go at this for ages, great exercise!

Fill a waterproof container with about 1-2 cm depth of water and sink treats in it and watch your rats dip thier paws in and out of the water as they try to land a catch!

Make them work for thier treats! I don't give out treats for nothing, I make my girls walk on thier hind legs, fall backwards into my palm or stand up for a treat. It gets thier brains ticking over and once you do it enough times they will do the trick without the treat (a somewhat Pavlovian response as opposed to a dog doing because they want to please you, but still, cute and gets them thinking / exercising!)

Pretend you are fiddling with something. If Kitty is going places she's not allowed, I stop giving her attention and focus on something in my hands, just pick up anything and fiddle! Kitty normally comes running to se what I'm doing as she is so nosey!

Everyone, please add more rat games to this thread if there is anything your rats particularly like!

an1mal_l0ver

This sounds really cruel, but one of my girlfriend's female rats called Rolo, LOVES falling..... lmao!

I know, cruel and odd but she does! My girlfriend got her last yr and the first thing she did was jump straight out of the shop assistants hands! When my girlfriend got her back hoome, Rolo had a little cuddle with her and then jumped full pelt off her hand, onto the PC which is, I'd say about 2/3 maybe 4 foot away from where she would have been. Rolo has next to no fear, my girlfriend can chuck her about 30cm into the air and catch her again (with their being her lap or something soft and safe underneath incase)
I remember holding her once on my shoulder, I let my hand move from her for a split second and she slid right down my back, onto my bum and leaped onto the floor (I was standing up at the time) and I've never experienced anything so funny in my life! As soon as she's high up, she wants to try and jump to the next thing or jump to the floor, she's a nutter!

I do believe that I may be my own rats favourite climbing frame! That's pretty much a fact now between us. I chase them about on my bed and chase them around the floor. That towel thing sounds a great idea! I've been looking into ways to build up my boys strength and climbing abilities, because I think its right every rat should know how to climb and jump properly and confidently and my two seem to love all that. I don't stop them at all when they climb up the back of the settee or jump about by themselves, its all natural insticts with them afterall.

We don't have any "games" as such but I have been noseying about in our garage for a few weeks trying to find some stuff I could convert into a mini playground for them Razz

might be interesting I suppose lol