# Keeping the cage clean?



## Hippy (Jul 23, 2007)

So, my cage problem is that the little buggers wont keep it clean!
I have a litter corner green pan thing that you see at pet stores, and a food storage dispenser I just got, I hope it keeps them from getting food everyone when they search for their favorite foods. I also have a dish under their water bottle in case it drips.

I don't know how but food and fluff is still everywhere! [fluff I use for their litter pans.

They have towels and stuff as bedding but man are they messy messy!

Any ways to keep the cage cleaner?


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## chrisstrikeagain (Apr 10, 2007)

As opposed to fluff for a litter, try yesterday news. Its heavier and wont go all over the place. As for food, Which kind it is. I had lab blocks, which created too many crumns. Also i had a seed mix(bad for them), and it would be empty shells all over. Now its Nutro Lite, which is rat sized so no crumbs.


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## Forensic (Apr 12, 2007)

A heavy litter and a bigger box may help. 

The food... I can't help there.


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## SammyNova (Aug 26, 2007)

I use Kaytee brand Forti-Diet as food and I've yet to see any mess from that. Carefresh bedding as litter, that was only a problem when little ratties decided it was a good digging box, that has since been fixed by adding a straw filled soda box for them to dig in.


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## rat_ratscal (Sep 23, 2007)

SammyNova said:


> I use Kaytee brand Forti-Diet as food and I've yet to see any mess from that. Carefresh bedding as litter, that was only a problem when little ratties decided it was a good digging box, that has since been fixed by adding a straw filled soda box for them to dig in.


my rats do that too.. :?


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## cjshrader (Feb 15, 2007)

If your rats are like mine then there may be nothing you can do. I use Yesterday's news and the heavier part of it certainly doesn't help! They still get in there and dig and kick it out all over the place. They'll even carry a bunch of it up to the higher levels piece by piece. I don't get it! But it makes a huge mess and I've mostly given up on it.

Maybe a littler dish with higher walls would help though?


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## Mana (Apr 22, 2007)

My girls' cage is always a mess. There's nothing I can do about it. Crumbs from food gets everywhere (and the food itself, since Jellybean is a compulsive hoarder). Carefresh in the litter boxes gets thrown everywhere - switching to YN should help, according to everyone who uses it  Anything light like Carefresh and whatever you're using is too easy to push out and dig out, and play around in. I have shredded paper in boxes for them to dig around in, so of course that gets everywhere too.

I'm not sure there's much you can do, other than switching to YN and getting a bigger litter box with higher sides. Rats are messy little creatures ^_^


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## Sparker (Jun 17, 2007)

It might just be my rats, but I find that the more that I have in the cage for them to do, and the more time they have out, they less mess there is because they're not as bored.

But they are still rats, no matter what you do. :wink:


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## glindella (Sep 9, 2007)

SammyNova said:


> I use Kaytee brand Forti-Diet as food and I've yet to see any mess from that. Carefresh bedding as litter, that was only a problem when little ratties decided it was a good digging box, that has since been fixed by adding a straw filled soda box for them to dig in.



Off topic: That really isn't a good food, you might want to look into something better

On topic: I switched from carefresh because my boys used to take the big chunks and stuff their tubes then pee on the bedding :-( that really made things smell


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