Play fighting

The video below shows an example of Ronnie and Derek play fighting. Read more about this on the Habits page.

‘Summerats’

At the start of meteorological summer, here are some recent photos of Ronnie and Derek.

Click thumbnails to enlarge. More photos on the Photos page.

Feeling minty!

Ronnie and Derek recently enjoyed climbing around in the mint plant and eating bits of it! Watch a clip of this below.

Porphyrin around Derek’s nose

Yesterday evening, Derek had a dried, browny-red substance around his nose. It looked like dried blood at first, but was actually porphyrin which is a mucus-like substance. It can be a sign of excessive stress or a respiratory infection, but Derek had no other symptoms.

I cleaned his nose and, this morning, it was still clean. The internet assures me the porphyrin release was likely just a one-off, due to temporary irritation in Derek’s eye caused by something such as a piece of bedding or an eyelash getting in his eye, or maybe he scratched it while self-grooming.

As always with this sort of thing, I’ll keep an eye on Derek and make sure it was just a one-off.

This info about porphyrin has been added to the Care page.

Alert and Sleepy

This morning, Ronnie was feeling alert while Derek was the opposite…

Click thumbnails to enlarge. More photos on the Photos page.

Human fighting

Ronnie and Derek enjoying play-fighting with each other (more info here), but have recently started to often roll on their backs in the cage when I go to pick them up, so I can ‘groom’ them in the way they groom each other while fighting. Watch a video of this below.

Homely Cucumber

Ronnie and Derek have been enjoying some home-grown cucumber over the last few weeks. The variety is La Diva and the plant produced a good crop which have lasted in the fridge for many weeks.

Click thumbnails to enlarge. More photos on the Photos page.

Good evening from the Ratbags!

Click thumbnails to enlarge. More photos on the Photos page.

Mint plant

Rats enjoy eating herbs and I bought a mint plant which Ronnie and Derek were interested to explore. Ronnie ate some mint but wasn’t very impressed, but Derek loves it and had a good time searching through the leaves and picking some to eat. Watch the videos and photos below!

Click thumbnails to enlarge. More photos on the Photos page.