# Cage bar spacing and lack of bars



## ratticus333 (Oct 20, 2016)

After the death of one of my rats (Selma) I got a new cage for Patty, she's currently on her own and I had some trouble finding new rats, I kept being messed around but I finally found a breeder in this area who is very helpful and I am picking up two new rats on the 18th. My problem is that the cage is bigger than I thought it'd be, it's a rat & ferret cage by pet planet. I can't put a lot of what I want in there because the bars are vertical and it's difficult to hang stuff up too because there's not a lot of top bar space. I also think the bar spacing will be too big for the young rats I'll be getting. Anyway I was wondering if anyone else has or had rat & ferret cage from pet planet. Do you think small rats will fit through the bars? and has anyone got any tips on how to accessorize the cage. I'll try attaching a picture.


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## Rana (Jun 18, 2017)

How old are the rats you're getting? I got my girls at about 8 weeks and they were *tiny*! I'd covered their cage with hardware mesh and they still managed to get out of a gap about a 1/4 inch wide. I don't know for sure what the measurement on that cage is, but I'm betting it's around 1" spacing, which would be too big for any young rat, and even possibly grown females/smaller males as well.

The good news is that if you cover the bars of the cage with a layer of hardware mesh, you can very easily attach hammocks, etc, to the mesh rather than the cage's bars, which solves the vertical bar problem. And if you put the mesh on the inside of the cage, your rats will have a much easier time climbing around, also.


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## ratticus333 (Oct 20, 2016)

Thanks so much for your help, I would have never thought of that haha and yeah it'd be much better for climbing. My rat Patty is 2 years old and she can't fit through the bars luckily, but she still likes to climb and is unable to with it having vertical bars. The rats I'm getting will be 8 weeks so yeah they'll be too small. I'll have a look at getting some wire mesh.


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## CorbinDallasMyMan (Feb 24, 2017)

I believe this is the cage that you have. If so, you're just fine. The bar spacing is 14 mm (or about a half inch) so you should have no problem with keeping young rats inside. 

Hanging accessories from vertical bars is a bit more limiting but I'm sure you'll be able to figure stuff out with some experimentation. Cages like the Liberta Explorer have vertical bars and the Aventura has vertical bars on the sides so you could look for pictures and videos of those cages to get ideas/inspiration of how to hang accessories.


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## ratticus333 (Oct 20, 2016)

Yeah that's the cage I have. I just found my tape measure and the widest bar spacing is on top of the cage along one side and it's 2cm so yeah just over half an inch. I've been looking at pictures of other cages to get ideas. That's a good plan though to look up what other people have done with similar cages with vertical bars thank you


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## ratticus333 (Oct 20, 2016)

Just looking and the Liberta Explorer is pretty much identical. I've noticed people with that cage are having to hang the ends of hammocks on one of the doors like I'm having to haha


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