# Antisocial Rats



## Failoore (Dec 17, 2017)

So whenever I try to find someone giving advice on antisocial behavior, it's about rescued rats, pet store rats, aggressive rats, or generally rats that fear human contact. The thing is, mine don't.

Mine are 9 months old, I had them since they were month old (2 boys). I feel like they got used to me pretty well. They are fed once a day with handful of dry food, that I make at home. And they also get fruits and veggies and treats. They get as much roam time as possible (once a day from 1 hour to couple hours), I thought giving them more roam time would make them more tired and more interested in people but it didn't so I stopped. I try to avoid giving them food when they are out of cage because they try to hide it and then it smells and goes bad and I usually can't even find it but of course small treat sized is fine, as they eat it right away.

So, when they are in cage, they either eat/drink and mostly sleep. I have never seen them chew on toys but they are chewed so, yeah. When they are out of the cage, they run around the room, bite into cards, wooden stuff, plastic stuff. I try to hide everything that I don't want destroyed. Sometimes I like to train them but they seem to be distracted so much, it's like they are hyperactive so I just let them run around. My point is, they either try to eat things, or they try to eat things, they've already explored the whole room so there's nothing else to do, really.

And I always tried to avoid pets that you can't have connection with, like snakes or spiders. I thought rats would be great, as I saw a lot of videos and pictures and articles about how affectionate rats can be, almost like dogs. I never saw this in my rats and I don't know what I do wrong, they usually come to me but just to eat my earphones or pee on my mouse when I'm on my laptop, as soon as i touch them they go away, like as fast as possible , sometiems they also squeak. The more I try to have physical contact, the more they try to run away.

Lately they bristle their fur, on eachother and on me and today one of them bit me, biting lasted around 4 seconds and it wasn't to blood but I could see it was aggresive, it wasn't just hit and run and that's where I realized something's wrong because all this time I thought we were playing, as the rat was coming back after I playfully touched it on the back over and over.

I don't know what to do. I can give them treats but I don't feel like it helps with bonding. It's just...food. They eat it, they go away, they don't care. They literally never stay with me or my boyfriend for longer than a second.

Am I just super lucky to get two male rats with "I don't care about you" personality? Or am I doing/not doing something I should?
(I copied this from a post I made on reddit, hopefully it's fine, I just need as much opinions as possible)


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## Shadow <3 (Jan 25, 2017)

I have to ask how old your boys are. Some male rats are unfortunately hit by hormonal aggression at 4-6 months of age. This can manifest as human aggression, rat aggression, or both. And as the testicles produce testosterone for a males entire life, the only way to remedy this issue is to neuter the rat in question.




Fur bristling and biting seems to point to hormonal aggression in my book. The other option could be that you have a strange rat like my girl Berry, who just gets so excited and anxious when you play hand wrestling/tickling games with her that she'll bite if you don't read the warning signs. But I saw this with Berry from day one, and even when she was a tiny baby she would do what your describing, seeming to playfully run away and bound back when playfully touched, only to puff and bite hard after a few rounds. Turns out that Berry just can't handle that kind of excitement, and I now play with her by using a string/cat toy/straw which I drag around (rats are surprisingly predatorial and all but the calmest ones will chase and pounce on a moving string).




Squeaking is also a sign of discomfort. If you want to change that, you can counter-condition them to like touch like I did with my girl Cream. Back when I first brought her home, I quickly got her to tolerate handling just fine. But she shied away from being touched and would squeak if you forced the issue. So I began pairing touch with her favorite treat ever: meat baby food. You have to remember that food is the ultimate positive in the animal world. Its not so much bribing them to like your touch as it is changing their state of mind. about it So with Cream, I would stroke her cheeks, then feed some meat babyfood off my hand (liquid treats prevented her from running off and had the added benefit of adding more value to my hand). Then after a while, I stroked her head and then fed food (feed after the stroking, you want a cause and effect relationship). Then I gradually started stroking areas out of her line of sight, always feeding meat baby food afterward to reward her not moving away. Finally, I moved on to rough petting/handling. I would ruffle her fur, then feed, pick her up suddenly then put her down and feed, and so on. We gradually got to the point that I could ruffle her fur roughly, pick her up, turn her upside down, and even scruff her before feeding and she wouldn't have any issue with it. Finally, once she associated all of these actions with good things, I stopped feeding treats after each one as she already associated touch with positive reactions. I see a huge change in Cream after doing all of this, she much more likely to hang around me like my friendliest girl Latte naturally does, and she enjoys sitting/sleeping in my lap/shirt on occasion. Cream doesn't exactly love cuddling like my girl Latte, but she will tolerate and even enjoy it to certain extents.




I do have an "indifferent" girl though, who actually reminds me the most of what your describing about your rats. Berry came to me a biter, and once she got over it, she became pretty indifferent to me. She doesn't like humans for affection or anything, just for transportation and tricks/treats. She's alright with handling, tolerates and volunteers for it but only to get to where she wants. SUper smart girl, learned lots of awesome tricks and even taught me to put her back into the cage when she climbs onto my left shoulder. But she's just not sociable. I'll admit, I haven't worked as much with her ever since we crossed the whole biting issue. I've mainly done trick training with her, not counter-condition exercises. But even if I did do counter-conditioning exercises, I don't think it'll change the fact that she's just an independent rat. She likes me well enough, and likes her cagemates, both both me and them seem optional to her. Sometimes she'll sleep with them, sometimes she'll sleep alone. She lets them groom her, but rarely reciprocates. And the only time she's been cuddly with me is back when I had a super cuddly female Shadow, who she adored and would come and sleep with when Shadow chilled in my lap. Then and only then would she accept petting, and if she realized it was me touching her and not Shadow, she would usually get up and move away. That's just how she is, and unfortunately its just her natural personality. I love her, but she's never going to view me in the same light as more human oriented rats (like her sister Latte).








Finally, age can play a hug factor in how your rats treat you. My most human oriented girl Latte was gentle and sweet as a pup, but not cuddly at all. She would play with me, and occasionally chill in my lap, but for the most part she was too busy to cuddle. Once she hit 1.5 years old, she began slowing down and began asking for cuddles. Its now been several months, and while she's still an active rat, she'll stick by me in the free-range area and will ask to cuddle at least once a day. My other human oriented girl Cookie is just 7 months old, and while she likes to play and be near me, she has no time for cuddling. She's constantly on the go, and would rather climb my body or do tricks for me than cuddle. I think she'll calm down as she ages, but only time will tell.


I would personally look into a possible neuter for the boy who's starting to bite you, as it really could help the situation. Barring that, I'd look for other ways to engage the rats. You only get out of a pet what you put into it, and I've put hours into training my girls the most complex tricks out there. Anything from fetching money from a purse to agility to weave walking between my legs or doing a wall handstand, anything is possible if you have some time and patience. You can also play the same games with them as you would with a cat, using a cat wand or just a plain string or straw and dragging it along the floor to encourage your rats to chase and pounce on it. My girls love this game so much that they'll perform simple tricks for it! Other than that, just keep trying to pet them and maybe lay off on the more stimulating wrestling games. As I've experienced, some rats just can't handle it and its best not to push them.




Good luck, rats are fantastic pets but I think their affection is over rated. As someone who's had 2 cuddly girls out of 7 rats, I think its unrealistic to expect every rat to be cuddly, especially if your rats are under a year old. I'm sure you'll find some other ways to interact with your boys, and I encourage you to think about things like trick training or having them chase objects as other ways of interacting with them


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## Failoore (Dec 17, 2017)

Shadow <3 said:


> I have to ask how old your boys are. Some male rats are unfortunately hit by hormonal aggression at 4-6 months of age.


They are 9 months old. I mentioned that in the post and actually one person on reddit mentioned this as well. Unfortunately I wouldn't be able to neuter him in a near future but would separation help? Or should I just make them more busy? I can't find a job atm so I can be with them all day, it's just I don't really know how to help the bonding.



Shadow <3 said:


> Squeaking is also a sign of discomfort. If you want to change that, you can counter-condition them to like touch like I did with my girl Cream.


This seems like a great training. Should I do it with them both at the same time or separately?



Shadow <3 said:


> I do have an "indifferent" girl though, who actually reminds me the most of what your describing about your rats. Berry came to me a biter


Sounds like you handled her great. Though, mine didn't come to me as biters, in fact as soon as they got comfortable with me, they just kind of, ignored me I'd say.



Shadow <3 said:


> Finally, age can play a hug factor in how your rats treat you.


Seems Like that could work, though I have plenty of time in the meantime and I'd like them to be healthy and have a good relationship with me.




Shadow <3 said:


> I would personally look into a possible neuter for the boy who's starting to bite you, as it really could help the situation. Barring that, I'd look for other ways to engage the rats. You only get out of a pet what you put into it, and I've put hours into training my girls the most complex tricks out there.


Whenever I engage training, they seem to like it but only for a while. They know how to spin so they spin and if they see it's not working and it's not what I'm looking for, they go search around room for other things to do. Yesterday I tried to teach both of them separately to go through a tape (circle) and even though I had lovely, smelly cheese they just after few tries went away.



Shadow <3 said:


> Good luck, rats are fantastic pets but I think their affection is over rated. As someone who's had 2 cuddly girls out of 7 rats, I think its unrealistic to expect every rat to be cuddly, especially if your rats are under a year old. I'm sure you'll find some other ways to interact with your boys, and I encourage you to think about things like trick training or having them chase objects as other ways of interacting with them


The thing is a lot of people who reply to me have female rats. Generally male should be more calm and I just can't believe I got two of them that just aren't the cuddly type.


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## Shadow <3 (Jan 25, 2017)

I wouldn't separate them unless they were harming each other. Its not going to change how they interact with you anyway, as rats tend to treat humans and other rats very differently. 

For desensitization purposes, it doesn't really matter if you do it separately or not. Just be aware that you'll need to be focusing on one rat at a time regardless. With Cream, I started off using my most confident girl Latte as an example. Latte sat on my lap and ate treat after treat, and I used her to keep Cream coming back to me (Cream was timid in the beginning, and wouldn't usually approach me on her own). Once Cream grew okay with me, I let Latte and the others run around but focused on feeding Cream for letting me touch her. I recon I could have done it with just Cream out, but the others gave her confidence so i just let them stay out and occasionally gave everyone treats.


When I say my Berry reminds me of your rats, I'm not referring to the biting, just to her attitude towards people in general. Berry has always been pretty indifferent to being handled, and even when she was a biter she never bit when held or picked up. She'd only bite if your hands were directly in front of her, in a "get out of my way" sort of manner. She hasn't bitten in over a year now, yet still remains fairly indifferent. For example, I'll take her out of the cage and release her into the free-range area to play. She'll run around, then climb the "rat tower" I made especially for her and sleep there. All the other rats continue to play near me, but Berry is just "ehh". When she wakes up, she'll come over and see if I'm willing to give her treats or train with her, but if I'm not she'll quickly wander off. And if I try and stroke her for too long, she'll just walk off. Periodically she'll check back to see if treats are incoming, or if she's done playing, she'll ask to be put back into the cage. She's my only rat that actually loves the cage as much as free-range time, and making myself the source of going back easily has really calmed her down during playtime.


As for training, I would actually try a lower value reward. Cheese is all well and good, but my rats get sick of such rich foods quite quickly. For example, they ADORE meat baby food, yet after eating it for maybe 5 minutes of training they'll either get full or sick of it and run away. I use Cheerios and Gerber puffs broken into 2-4 pieces each and get much better results, in that the rats are willing to perform much longer and they tend to eat the treat much faster. Another thing to look at is your training method. I personally love shaping, but it can be difficult for both the trainer and the animal, especially if your not using a clicker. Luring is the easiest way to train most tricks, and I'd say its probably the best way to train something like walking through a hoop. You could also try something liquid like meat baby food, as this makes luring them through something much easier as they can eat while they walk. Finally, I'd recommend "paw" as a good trick to train after spin. Its pretty easy for the rat to learn, and almost seems to be an instinctual behavior for some of my girls. Plus, it teaches them that spin is not the only trick out there, and that they need to differentiate between two cues. Backup is another easy trick to train, just place your index and middle finger in a straddle over the rats head and gently squeeze, all while presenting food in front of them. Once they get uncomfortable and back away, immediately reward them. Then slowly move the straddle down their backs, until your holding it slightly behind them. They'll learn to back up whenever your pinch your fingers in front of them, and its a cute trick that can be used to train many other ones. 


And as for the whole fact that they're males, you'll find that many people on this site have males that just aren't cuddly. That really is a stereotype among fancy rats, and doesn't hold up nearly as much as you'd think. Now I haven't had males, but I've spoken to many on here who have, and the majority of them don't actually seem to have that many cuddly males. Lots of people have lazy males who won't cuddle, or active ones who will. There's really no set personality or factor. And age is again a factor, many peoples rats just don't become cuddly till 1 or older, male or otherwise. This doesn't mean you can't have a good relationship with them, I mean my relationship with Berry is just fine. She just interacts with me differently, preferring to chase a string or learn tricks than be touched or held. She also likely to ride my shoulder and explore places around the house, something her friendlier and cuddlier sister really dislikes. It's just her personality, and that's that.


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