Emma Jones
Your intelligent rats need to be nurtured mentally and physically every day. This works best with a little adventure through the rat room. We will show you how to make the outdoor area particularly attractive for your rats every day.
Rats are real intelligent beasts and have a high urge to move. As a rat keeper, you have to pay attention to this! It doesn’t matter how big the cage is: the rats must be taken out of it at least once a day and have an outdoor run. Our tips will show you how to create a rat paradise!
Prepare the rat run properly
Before your rats go exploring, you need to prepare a few things. Delimit the intended area with a fence or cardboard boxes, for example. Since rats can jump very high, the height of the boundary should be at least one meter. But it is also possible to redesign the whole room to run. Then, however, it is important to pay particular attention to where dangers for the rats could lurk.
All plants and other poisonous objects must be removed from the run. Likewise, cables have no place in rats’ paradise – just as little as pointed or sharp objects. In this way, serious accidents can be avoided. Valuable furniture or clothing should also be put away – your rats could gnaw on them. Gaps, such as behind or under cupboards, must be closed. Despite precautions, you should always stay close to the rats: the animals are real escape artists!
Rats love climbing trees in the run
Climbing opportunities should definitely be given in the free run. Many rat keepers use cat scratching posts – rats can let off steam here. To keep the scratching post clean for as long as possible, the newspaper can be placed on the intermediate levels to absorb the urine. Alternatively, of course, branches can also be used on which the rats can climb.
You can also easily make a rat climbing tree yourself from wooden posts or a tube (e.g. made of plastic or thick cardboard) about 2 m long. The post is screwed onto a stable wooden base. Several wooden boards (e.g. measuring approx. 20 x 40 cm) are attached to the posts with angle brackets. For example, you can attach curved downpipes (with a diameter of at least 12 cm), thick branches, ropes (with a diameter of approx. 3 cm), rope ladders, and cozy hammocks between the different floors.
Toys upgrade the rat release
Rats love running through tunnels! Offer your darlings plastic tubes that you can line with newspaper or kitchen paper – this way the animals don’t have to lie in their own urine. Fabric and Raschel tunnels offer an exciting variety. Regardless of which toys you choose, the rat should be able to follow all of its typical behaviors in the run.
Also, be careful not to overcrowd the run: there should be enough empty space for the rats to romp, play, and run.
Rats want to be encouraged in the run
Your little rats are extremely intelligent and therefore need small cognitive challenges every day. Intelligence toys such as snack balls are particularly useful during exercise. By pushing the ball, the rat gets the treats. It is just as easy to use intelligence toys for dogs or cats for your rats.
But be careful: the individual parts of the toy must not be sharp-edged and, above all, not too heavy for the small animals.
Even rats need a break in the run
In the time outside the usual enclosure, the rat should of course let off steam mentally and physically. Still, she needs a little breather every now and then. In order for the rats to recover, you should integrate small houses and tubes into the run. Blankets also provide a cozy base to relax on.
Hammocks can also be very attractive to rats: simply clip the ends of old tea towels to the tiers of the rat tree (or to the cage rails) with clothespins. The towels can be easily removed for washing.