# Are they true hairless or double rex?? Cute little dumbos.



## Russa (Dec 4, 2011)

Someone suggested that I crosspost this over here to see what you guys thought and if you'd better be able to tell. Either way, we are adopting one of the champagne babies and will be bringing them home in a couple of weeks.These are the parents (I believe), which appear to be true hairless: (Unless the little splotches are fur. I believe it's champagne skin pigment)









And here are the babies! We plan on getting a hairless pup and then a furred pup to grow together. In hopes that the furred companion can help keep the little hairless warm. Ideally they would come from the same litter, so I reserved both a champagne and the little black one, but we don't want two hairless because then they'd have more trouble keeping warm.









The problem is, I'm not sure that these guys are true hairless, double rex or furred. They seem to have a very fine layer of fur and the breeder says they will shed that, but if both the parents are true hairless..I'm wondering if any of these are hairless. If the parents are bald double rexes, we could go with two from the same litter and I think they'd be okay.

Here are close ups. (The fur seems really fine.)



















Like I said. We are getting one either way, I'd just like to know a little more so I can decide what would be best for picking the companion.

Thank you! We are so excited. They are just soo cute.

I asked the breeder a few days ago and they haven't got back. They may not be checking their email as they said they'd contact back when the pups were ready to be picked up. I really like the breeder and have seen her other animals, which appeared to be in great shape.


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## mink (Jun 24, 2007)

Adorable! <3

Not personal experience, but I've heard multiple times that it is nearly impossible to tell hairless from double-rex, unfortunately. 
There can be fuzzy / patchy hairless (which would be the opposite side of true hairless), or fuzzy / patchy double-rex. 
If you have a while yet to wait, then you could see just how much fur they do or do not lose. Either way, I think the care and warmth issues are the same for both varieties. 
I do know that hairless females are prone to troubles producing milk, and therefore most people wouldn't want to breed a hairless female. 
If the mother had no troubles at all, then it might point to her being double-rex - but 5 is a smaller litter. 

I am very interested in the subject myself, since my friend got a hairless rat from a store and it had babies - she is giving me 2 of them. 
Her hairless female had trouble producing milk, and even with my friend's intervention, only 4 rittens survived.
But all her babies have the same coat type so, I'm just adopting the 2 males. Luckily, we have a space heater in the room the rats will be in, and a nice collection of hammocks n stuff.


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## HighwayStar (Aug 20, 2010)

Those babies are so dang adorable~! I hope some day I am able to have a little naked rat. Totally jealous.


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## smesyna (Nov 22, 2010)

Looks can't tell you if a rat is a true hairless or double rex. There are hairless that are very fuzzy and double rex that are to all appearances furless.

I find it concerning that your breeder can't tell you this. They should know if they are breeding them, if they don't know something as simple as hair type, how can they be breeding for health?


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## Russa (Dec 4, 2011)

Thank you Mink! I saw your post about your precious little ones and I know exactly the excitement you are going through having to wait. We also have a little space heater and are going to be using cloth for the cage. Since either would need a fuzzy companion, I'll probably be finding one from another. We only want two now, as the one hairless is going to be enough work. I'll keep you guys updated on what happens with the fur.

Highwaystar-Dawwhh why thank you! We are huge fans of hairless. Extra trouble. Extra love. <3

smesyna-It's not that she can't tell me, she just hasn't got back to me. Could be a lot of reasons for that, but she seemed pretty confident that these were going to loose their fur. She said the litter was bigger, but these were the ones advertised as 'hairless dumbos' that I could pick from..so maybe she picked the ones with the proper fur type? The other pups may have thicker or curly fur? Not sure, but I definitely wanted to get other opinions as this subject seems to have many answers. One forum said that true hairless NEVER have fur, even when they are pups and were very pissy about it. I've learned since then that that is not true, but the person saying so claimed to be a 'rat expert'..as a lot of people on online forums do. Lots of mixed messages.

Thank you though! I don't mind waiting to find out. When I go pick up the pup(s) I'll check over the parents living quarters and see the conditions of all in person. If they don't appear to be well cared for, I won't be buying. I'm not a expert on rat health yet, but I've owned reptiles long enough to know hers look great.


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## smesyna (Nov 22, 2010)

This is what the charles river hairless rats look like:

http://jhered.oxfordjournals.org/content/93/3/210/F2.large.jpg

Not very "hairless." 

With rat breeding it's not so much how well they take care of them, (though that is required), but how they are improving health. There are a lot of things breeders can unknowingly propagate with their breeding if they are not carefully tracking their lines. Many heart issues, myco resistance, etc are genetic. Megacolon is too.

I'd suggest reading this to help you evaluate your breeder:

http://www.blackwolfrattery.com/redflags.html


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## wheeljack (Mar 17, 2011)

Both true hairless and double-rex pups will loose some or all of their coat when molting out their baby coat. As was said earlier we can't tell by looking, the amount of fur is no indication. Also, are you calling the babies champagne or is that what your breeder is calling them? Champagne is a black rat with the pink eyed dilute and the babies don't appear to have pink eyes, it could be the camera angle but they look ruby which would make them either beige or fawn depending if they are agouti or not. If it's your breeder calling them champagne, I would be somewhat concerned she isn't able to correctly identify the color. If you are determined to get one of these, it doesn't really matter if the rat is a true hairless or double-rex because hopefully you aren't planning on breeding them and care is the same for both. Just get whichever ones you like, if it's two bald ones they'll be fine.

You can also keep two hairless or two double-rexes together. It's nice for them to have a furred rat to snuggle with but it is my no means mandatory. Many people keep entire colonies of bald rats without an issue.


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