# Is there really any rhyme or reason?



## FallDeere (Sep 29, 2011)

I don't want to make this a memorial thread as much as a discussion of those we've lost...

Today, my first rat Silver had to be put down. She was a bit over two years old, from Petsmart on September 8th, 2012 (she was a few months old already), and had respiratory issues all her life. In the end, the vet believes cancer made her susceptible to infection, which led to extreme blood loss. She led a good long life, though. Especially for a petstore rat.

Almost exactly four months ago (April 30th, 2014), I lost my boy Bartok whom I bought from a breeder. He was born on September 21st (approx.), 2012. I'm not 100% sure what exactly caused his death, but what caused the _cause _of his death was losing the use of his back legs. Maybe he got pneumonia from lack of movement or maybe his heart just gave out, but he died during the night, unable to breath. At just over a year and a half old, he lost the use of his back legs and died. He was young, practically in his prime and in absolutely perfect health. Shoot, he'd _barely _even lived. Yet, his father lived for three years and his brother and half-brother are (as far as I know) are still in great health!

I have two other two year old rats from Petsmart, both of which have mammary tumors but are in otherwise good health and a nearly two year old rat from Petco that has had less respiratory issues than _any _of my rats (even ones from breeders) and so far has no traces of tumors. Fingers crossed!

Is there really any rhyme or reason for how long rats live and how many health issues they are bombarded with? Have any of your rats lived a surprisingly short or surprisingly long time? Especially considering the conditions they came from? Do you think it is the luck of the draw or that good or bad breeding actually strongly impacts a rat's future health or lack thereof?


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## kksrats (Jul 25, 2014)

This has nothing to do with a rat who has died, but with one who I'm surprised is so healthy. One of the first rats I ever rescued is now 2 years old and has never even had so much as a respiratory infection. She came from a horrible store at 4 months old, I kept her for a while until I was sure she was healthy then gave her to a friend who needed a companion for her female whose cage mate had recently passed. Honestly, I expect most of the rats that I pick up from that store to have horrible problems. One dropped dead at 6 months for apparently no reason and others have had mild resp problems, but that girl is just strong and feisty. A lot of it has to do with luck of the draw on genetics, surroundings, etc, but I've come to the conclusion that you can just never tell unless you do a full genetic screen on your rat's dna or keep them in a bubble their whole life.


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## FallDeere (Sep 29, 2011)

That's impressive. Even my most healthy rat gave me a respiratory scare recently, though she has recovered wonderfully from it with Baytril. I hope that girl continues to be wonderfully healthy.


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## kksrats (Jul 25, 2014)

I hope so too. I get updates on her every few weeks. She has some very mild behavioral issues, but other than that she's just healthy and stubborn  I wish that it was easier to predict health in rats, but maybe it's a good thing that we don't really know what we're getting until it's too late. Even the most unhealthy and short lived rat is likely to give us some great days and having a rat like that in a loving home is much better than the alternative


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## LeStan82 (Dec 31, 2013)

I think its luck of the draw and genetics. The health of the individual it self also. I rescued a momma cat and her 4 babies that were barely few hours old. I kept them until the babies were old enough to find homes. 4 kittens. Momma found a home, 2 babies found a home together and I kept the other 2. The 2 kittens that were adopted died at a year old and momma died a few months apart.All different genetic disorders were the cause. But my 2 kittens are now almost 7 yrs. Old and are healthy. It was genetics from the mother, my kittens must have had stronger genetics from the father. ( the 2 kittens looked just like the mother(black/white), my 2 must have looked like the father grey/white)It was very weird! Ive never seen anything like that before, and ive seen some pretty crazy stuff.


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## HeatherElle (Aug 16, 2012)

It feels like luck. We bought two feeder rats together and one died at 8.5 weeks while the other just passed away at 3 years and never had an illness in his life. Our breeder rat, whose dad lived til 5, died from a fast growing tumor around 1.5-2. Our rescue that was dumped at Petco is still going strong at over 3. We had other rescues go from tumors or respiratory issues around 2-3. Maybe there is a rhyme or reason but it sure feels like a roll of the dice.


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## PaigeRose (Apr 12, 2013)

Thats funny, I posted some similar questions a week or so ago. 

I haven't lost any of my rats yet. My oldest is Sophie, who was said to be "about a year" when we got her. We originally went for her two babies, Nugget and Marci, but were asked to take momma too and I'm glad we did because she's definitely my heart rat! I definitely believe Nugget and Marci were born early 2013 because they were very small. Now, that would currently place them at over 1.5 yrs and Sophie at even older. Nugget is sporting a small tumor under her arm and Marci has this bald patch that won't go away. They have both also slowed down considerably. Sophie runs and jumps and demands attention like no tomorrow. She's always been lean, always been active, and just shows no signs of age at all! She doesn't look any different from the day we brought her home. 

And I always wonder, will she outlive her daughters? Or will she decline suddenly? I guess theres no way to tell unless you have records of all their family...

ETA: The girl we got Sophie, Marci, and Nugget from worked at a Petsmart and said Sophie and the father came from her store.


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## kksrats (Jul 25, 2014)

Even if you've got extensive family histories for a genetic line, you still don't really know what's going to happen when you outcross or even inbreed. You can have a genetic carrier for something that is perfectly healthy until you just happen to cross them with another carrier and then you see the disease in their offspring...but not all of them. This is why it's important for breeders to keep track of any and all offspring that they do not keep in their home because the ones that they just happen to adopt out and don't keep track of could be the ones that express the disease while they just keep blindly breeding carriers. There's a lot of thought that has to be put into trying to improve the health of rats through breeding and it's a fairly daunting task though I know that there are quite a few people out there doing their best to give us the best pets possible while making our ratties as healthy and robust as they can for their sake and our own. I'd say that if rats were not sold as food for other animals, we'd have much healthier rats instead of being inundated with feeders and farms, but then again, you have to look at back yard dog breeders and puppy mills. People will do anything for a buck unfortunately, including cutting corners and skimping on necessities.


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## Rat Daddy (Sep 25, 2011)

OK, so here's the real deal... it takes hundreds if not thousand of rats bred and followed over multiple generations to really improve the genetics consistently... And the only folks that breed enough rats to make a difference aren't breeding for longevity and old age health.

Yes I know there are breeders that claim that their rats live longer and get sick less, but to be honest, it's a sales pitch not a documented fact.

To be clear some strains are worse than others... but no one has a produced a strain of "healthy rats" yet... If anyone really did, we would hear about it and there would be documentation to prove it.

Rats actually self destruct by design, they have a gene combination that makes them age, get sick and die. I suspect humans have the same type of genetic situation. Only starfish never get old as far as I know.... So yes there could be a thousand year old starfish out there. Everything else is limited by it's genes.

Now there is a holy grail out there... there's a certain defect in two genes that will cause a mouse to live double it's normal age. I suspect that same defect explains those few 5 and 6 year old rats we hear about. But so far no one has bred one or started a strain based on one of these long life rats... I suspect if you have the money, you could have a lab knock out the correct genes with rats like they did with mice... But until someone does that the long life rat will remain the holy grail of rats....

I might add that some GMO fish were bred in Japan to get bigger and live longer, when they were released they also got all of the dates, oddly the local fish population crashed... 

I can easily see where rats that live for six years would out compete their offspring... and eventually you would get a population of very old and very smart rats, then there would be the barely audible sound of silence as the last of the rats died off with no young rats there to replace them. Rats are designed to die young and make room for the next generation. And that's basically the rhyme and reason why there are so few very old rats out there regardless of what you do to keep them healthy or where you buy them.

And I'm very sorry to read about your loss....


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