# What are your favorite training treats?



## Linden (Nov 14, 2014)

I have never taught my rats a ton of tricks, but I always teach them to come when called and I have taught a few simple tricks to some of them (jump through a hoop is one of my favorites - it looks impressive for as easy as it is to learn). The hardest part of training for me is always coming up with good training treats. Something small enough I can give four or five of them, and yummy enough to encourage the rats to come for them. 

Cheerios are an easy favorite, and Ayame will do almost anything for a piece of kaytee forti-diet lab block. (I feed these to my hamster, and found out by accident that Ayame is crazy for them. I split them into pieces and use them as treats for her now.) 

What training treats have worked well for you? I'm always looking for ideas.


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## Sabatea (Aug 23, 2014)

Baby food on a finger or the end of a syringe. My rats absolutely beg for it. XD Dela will pick up the entire syringe, steal it from you, and hide just to lick off all of the babyfood. So far that's the biggest hit with my pair. Both of them go crazy for it and I've been trying to teach Dela to "find the treat" underneath the right cup by putting a bit of babyfood on the inside.


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## ratbasket (Apr 26, 2014)

I actually like to use little bits of romain lettuce, or mashed banana on my finger, I also just use their oxbow food if I happen to have time to train them when it's time to feed them... basically I just use whatever I have on hand for them. Grapes, kale, banana, romain lettuce, peas, occasionally oats...


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## PawsandClaws (Jul 22, 2014)

Gerber baby puff stars. I break them up into 4 smaller pieces (although you can definitely use a whole one and give 5 consecutively), I just find the smaller pieces make for a longer training session. I love clicker training with the rats.


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## Linden (Nov 14, 2014)

I'm impressed that some of you feed soft foods from the end of your finger - I've had some very food-happy rats that would probably accidentally take part of my finger with them. Alaina and Adelaide are so sweet about food though, I wonder if they would lick food off me? Hmm...


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## new_rattie_mommy (Aug 24, 2014)

If you have fed food from a spoon before they will learn to gently lick it off. It takes them a while to get the hang of not trying to ferociously bite it though. and my daisy really likes to hold his food so he has trouble with not being able to take the spoon and hold it in his hands but Lily will sit there and be gentle as can be once he got the hang of it. So your rats should lick food off your finger just fine as long as they have learned how to lick off a spoon first otherwise they might not know how to be gentle yet. I like to use cereal as treats cuz they can eat alot of it. They love corn flakes. they love froot loops too but it's sugary so i try to avoid it. they also love applesauce off a spoon, or yogurt. They also love anything I'm eating...if I am eating my dinner and bring them something as a snack too so they won't eat mine, they will pretend they don't like theirs and just want to eat my food. They will eat almost anything that I am eating and eat a lot of it.


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## sova (Nov 19, 2014)

One of my rats is crazy about yogurt and licks it off the finger, the other one never even touched yogurt. Who uses baby food, could you please tell what exactly.


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## Sabatea (Aug 23, 2014)

What kind of babyfood? I use the Gerber food in the little packages. So far they've liked any and all flavors. I do tend to stick with the more dinner food flavors though. They generally have a "main dish" and "side". I think one I used was Ham and Sweet Potatoes or something along those lines.

My two got the hang of licking it off fingers pretty fast. Once Dela figured out that grabbing my finger and yanking on it didn't help her get to the food, she tried licking it. She licks off of syringes and and fingers now. Neera got it even faster, since she's a bit more nervous about new foods. Plus, initially the babyfood was for her since my vet said we should try to get her to gain a little weight. XD


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## ratbasket (Apr 26, 2014)

I have one very food hyped rat , and sometimes my fingers do get grabbed and nibbled, but it's usually gentle. I wouldn't worry about it too much.


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