# Surprise! (Pictures)



## Ivory (Dec 1, 2013)

My recent rescue, Agnes has seven babies a couple days ago. Here are a few pictures. I think two of the seven may be double rex. The foster I got her from said that her previous owner had her caged with an unaltered male hairless. We're assuming that's when she got pregnant. Agnes is estimated to be less than a year old. She's only my fourth rat, and I've never had the desire to breed before. I've done hours of research since she's had them, but any tips are welcomed. In the first pictures you can see most of them have pigment coming in save for two of them. I took a picture of one of the ones I believe to be double rex along with one that has its pigment coming in.


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## HelloClarice (Feb 1, 2012)

super cute! is Agnes a double rex too? I think you have to have two DR to make baby DRs but I'm not 100% about that


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## Ivory (Dec 1, 2013)

Agnes is not. She's a standard. I'm not sure, but I'll look it up. I guess we'll have to wait until they get a little older. I also plan on updating as they grow. At first I was worried about the litter, but now I'm rather excited! Sorry if I seem too enthused. Its hard not to get excited about babies.


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## HelloClarice (Feb 1, 2012)

Oh no we all understand, we can't help but love baby ratties and the pictures of them so we expect lots of pictures! 
At least it was a small litter though!


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## Ivory (Dec 1, 2013)

Here are some more pictures of the babies. I'll be sure to keep them coming, unless you guys decide you don't want to be spammed by tons of pictures. They're developing quite nicely and are getting cuter every day. I had some questions that I was hoping someone could answer. I'm not sure if there's a way to tell until they're older, but I think their father was a double rex. Is there a chance that the babies may be? A few people have told me that both parents need to be double rex in order to have hairless offspring. While others have said something to the effect that hairless females often don't produce milk, and therefore aren't bred. I guess I could always just wait and see, but I'm utterly confused.. Also, at this stage how do you distinguish males and females? I looked it up, but I'm either sexing them wrong, or they're all girls. Which I guess is possible.Sorry, as I've mentioned this took me totally by surprise. I would have never intentionally have had a litter. I've looked a lot of this stuff up, but some information is harder to find than some other. Also, I know I need to separate males and females at five weeks, but until I get hones for them is it okay to put the little females in with my older girls? After they're weaned, when is it okay to reintroduce Agnes back to Lucy and Alice? Should I wait or just put her back with them directly after five weeks?


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## SarahEden (Mar 5, 2013)

They look standard coat to me. You can tell by their whiskers. And not all hairless moms don't produce milk. I know lots of hairless moms that raised a litter fine.


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## bazmonkey (Nov 8, 2013)

Ivory said:


> I'm not sure if there's a way to tell until they're older, but I think their father was a double rex. Is there a chance that the babies may be? A few people have told me that both parents need to be double rex in order to have hairless offspring.


Both parents have to be at least rex to create a double rex. If dad was a double rex, you should have all rex/double-rex babies. If mom was also a rex, you'd have half rex, half double (average). If mom was not, you'd have all rex. If both were rex, 1/4 would be double, 1/2 rex, and 1/4 standard. BUT, as SarahEden pointed out, one looks standard judging by the straight whiskers, so dad probably wasn't double rex because that couldn't happen.

EDIT: the "hairless" gene is recessive, so I'm guessing that's what dad was. If that's true, and mom was completely standard (not a carrier), then your litter would be all standard coat and all carriers for hairlessness. It should be clearer once you can see their coats clearly.


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## Ivory (Dec 1, 2013)

That makes much more sense. Thanks for clearing up the confusion everyone. It's sort of a dumb thing to worry about, but if any of them had been hairless I know they require a bit different care and just wanted to be prepared. Thank you both for answering my questions!


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## Ivory (Dec 1, 2013)

Here's some more pictures of the babies. Two of them have curly whiskers and barely any fur coming in. I'm thinking Agnes may possibly have the rex gene. Its also been confirmed that she was only housed with that one male. I'm trying to find homes currently, although I may keep a couple. I'm in the Eastern Panhandle of WV/Western Maryland. If you guys know of anyone near me, I'm willing to drive a little too. Anyways, enjoy the pictures.


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## nanashi7 (Jun 5, 2013)

Make sure to post on the adoption forum, that helped me rehome 5 of my oops litter. I love the wee babies <3


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## Ivory (Dec 1, 2013)

Thanks, I'll be sure to post them up when they get a little older. They won't be ready until the end of December though. I've never had a rat uounger than six months, so this is all new and rather exciting!


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## Ivory (Dec 1, 2013)

Here they are nearly two weeks old. Some of them are starting to open their eyes. There's definitely two hairless. I think there's two males and five females. Agnes is a great mom! They're in a smaller wire cage with plastic bottom, but I know I have to move them to an aquarium here in a few days when they start moving around. Will a modified bin cage work? I'm just afraid Agnes will chew through it some how. I don't know if I gave a list yet, but there's one solid black with a white belly, two albinos, one grey hooded, one black hooded, one solid colored hairless, and one hooded hairless. I honestly wasn't aware hairless rats could have markings. I have combed through this site, and others, and I'm constantly learning new stuff. I don't think I'm going to foster/adopt any pregant females in the near future like I considered. I'm also going to be more aware of rats that I adopt. I need to get my females fixed, but I guess its not really needed if I don't have a male.


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## SarahEden (Mar 5, 2013)

How old will they be at the end of december? My rescue litter is 4.5 weeks old and they won't be ready till the end of december/first week of Jan. 

A cage with bars, providing they can't slip though them, will be better for them than a tank... as they can get more exercise and whatnot. I moved my babies from a tank into a cage when they were 2.5 weeks old.. then added everything to the cage i could think of to get them used to it all. They are pretty fearless now.


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