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Coloring: Sable brown hooded
Personality: Spaz
Arrived: 2/4/2008
On Monday, after work one day, my wife picked me up because we needed to go to the
pet store to get some supplies. She claims that she wasn't looking for a rat.
When she got to the ratties area, there was this little cutie running around and
sniffing everything. Most of the time, rats are a bit shy, so seeing one who
was so active was a surprise.
She asked me to get a salesperson to help us and as soon as she did, I knew we were
going to get a rattie. I didn't object. I knew it would be tough on
me but Izzy is cute. I have come to love our ratties and if we can spoil them,
then why not?
As soon as my wife held her, she was taken. The rat didn't poop on her, which
is a good sign. It means she will be playful. She carried her around
as we looked at the other rats. I wanted to get her a playmate, because our
other two are old for rats and didn't want her to be alone. As we looked at
the other rats, though, all of them were hiding. None of them were as outgoing
as the one we had now.
We decided we would call her Izzy. We were suggesting I names and this came
out through Isabelle, or something similar, but shortened. We took her home
that day.
Hiding next to mom.
Looking around her cage.
Most rats, at least the ones we have had, are very tentative. They are curious
but cautious. So, she stayed near the cage first, going all around it.
It's fun, because they will first keep their back legs on the top of the wire ramp
and stretch out as far as they can, sniffing and searching around. Then, they
will venture out, although sometimes they go right back inside. Izzy came
out but stuck next to the cage, exploring all around it.
It took Izzy about a week to move away from the cage. We have a pentapus (not
an octopus because it only has five arms) and she based from that for a while.
Now, though, she runs around the area. She still jumps at any noise, though,
and will scramble to her safe spot, whatever it happens to be. But, she is
pretty friendly and will come out pretty easily.
She still doesn't like to be picked up but that takes time.
4/6/2008
A lot has happened from our perspective.
Jennifer read a lot about rats and that spaying the girls really helps cut down
on problems, especially cancer, later. We talked with our vet about it and
she was sure about the surgery, so we had to make a decision. We decided to
do it.
Izzy was a bit more groggy after the surgery. Whereas Jax was up and running
around four days later, Izzy was still tentative. It was obvious the first
night was rough on them because they couldn't get comfortable. With stitches
on their bellies, who can blame them? Izzy seemed to be worse, for some reason.
She left her stitches alone but moved a bit slower.
However, ten days after the surgery, Izzy was fine! She was running around
the same as Jax and those two were playing together. So, she made it past
that, no problem.
Now that it is just the two of them, it's interesting to see young rats again.
We were so used to the older rats that having young ones again was strange.
They have so much energy! And they are still so cautious. They haven't
gotten used to us picking them up to give them kisses. It's strange.
But they will learn, especially about the kisses part because we give 'em lots of
those! |