# Are cages with wire bottoms bad?



## Dkeno (Apr 6, 2014)

I just got a pretty good winfall happen, and I want to upgrade my rats to a bigger cage (they really need more room to roam around). I found a few good double and triple ramps on Amazon, but som of them have those wired floors so that you can just slide out the bedding tray at the bottom to clean. I wanted to know if these are okay for rats, or if they would hurt their legs. these are the two I am looking at right now. They are both priced the same for me since I have a prime membership. Which should I get?

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/A13eGvWokgL._SL1500_.jpg

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/71G+hwnCPnL._SL1500_.jpg


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## ratmode (May 15, 2014)

Wire floors will hurt the rats' feet eventually, but you can just cover it with fleece or towels.


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## Dkeno (Apr 6, 2014)

ratmode said:


> Wire floors will hurt the rats' feet eventually, but you can just cover it with fleece or towels.


I could try that, but they tend to tug and chew on anything that is edible. Well....edible for rat standards


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## MaryLiz (Jun 15, 2014)

My rats live in one of the cages that have the wire bottoms with the tray beneath that slides out to clean... my solution to that (because the entire top of my cage opens) was to simply put the plastic tray inside the cage instead of underneath. Sadly the tray is too shallow and they want to push their bedding out, so the cage is currently also sitting with its base in a cardboard box. It is a working solution, but if I had it to do over I probably would not have chosen the particular cage I did.


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## Hey-Fay (Jul 8, 2013)

Chewed up fleece and towels come with owning rats. I periodically buy two to three yards of new fleece about every month. The old fleece gets recycled as bedding for igloos, hides, baskets and hammocks (in the winter months) and the new becomes shelf liners and new hammocks.


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## ratty_milkshake (Feb 24, 2014)

I just cover the wire bottom with newspaper and tiny bulldog clips. remove and replace every 2/3days.


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## Isamurat (Jul 27, 2012)

Whilst wire floors that are kept clean arent any more likley to cause bumble foot or similar than flat floors rats have been proven to prefer standing on a solid floor in a series of lab experiements.

However looking at that cage there is an easy solution, remove the wire floor and use the tray at the bottom as the base. Then if you get some corregated plastice and slot it in around the edges you could make a deep base to hold substrate and mess in. Much nicer than covering it with paper or similar and lets them dig and forage for food in a way fleece and paper just cant compete with


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## LittleSparrow (Apr 14, 2014)

You can always cover the wire shelving/floor with fleece, as mentioned above. The cage I have for my boys has wire shelving and I just cut out fleece, using tiny clamps to secure it so they can't tug it off.


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## inod3 (Jun 13, 2014)

The first one appears to have half inch bar spacing while the second is a Ferret Nation with 1" bar spacing. Younger rats and females may get through 1" bar spacing. I would probably go with the half inch bar spacing rather than the 1" bar spacing even though the floor is wiring. Or, if you like the ferret nation a critter nation would be a better choice - basically the same thing, but with half inch bar spacing.

As far as wire floors being bad or not it really depends. Usually people think of wire floors causing bumble foot but that's a pretty major oversimplification. The other risk is getting a foot caught. Wire flooring has been implicated as a contributor to bumble foot. So has damp fleece. I'm not aware of any studies done showing it to be the case, other than it makes sense to some people - it seems logical. I would say that neither of those is really as big a factor as obesity or sanitation. If the cage is kept clean I think floor choice is irrelevant as far as bumble foot (with common sense, you wouldn't want a floor made of upturned razor blades or nails obviously!) Obviously the rats will have a preference though! I like to offer a variety of floor/rest areas, as I think most people do. Nobody puts rats in a bare cage with nothing in it. They'll have their igloos, their hammocks, Amazon shipping boxes, etc... and can choose whatever is the most comfortable. Even in the cage with wire floor it has solid shelves so with nothing in there at all the rats still have a choice.


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## Mitsy (Apr 8, 2013)

If you don't want to use fleece, you could always buy the flooring that looks like tiles but is sticky and put it on the levels then all you have to do is keep that clean. Keep in mind they might chew the flooring and idk how healthy that would be. I've heard of a few using it. 

I just use binder clips and clip down the fleece. 

Wire floors are not bad, as long as wiped down regularly. They aren't all that comfy for your rats though. 


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