[erinsweeney]

First of all, these are my girls, Luna and Dagny.

We purchased Dagny as a feeder rat for our ball python a few weeks ago from our local family owned pet store. I have a few years' experience buying rats obviously and when I took her out to send her to her doom... she was the friendliest, smartest rat I'd ever seen! She had to be mine. I moved her into a 15 gal tank and began my research immediately. I read that rats are social and need friends, so after getting her settled for a week or two we returned to the pet store for another young female, which was Luna. I'm a vegan so so are they, simply because all we have in the house is vegan food. So their diet is mainly

Whole, thawed frozen peas and soybeans
pumpkin seeds
fresh veggies--faves include carrots, snow peas, and mushrooms.
fresh fruits--faves include apples, bananas, and cranberries
dried fruits--they like raisins but NOT dates
birdseed, and shoots grown from birdseed (we have a cockatiel and it seemed like a good supplement to the other stuff? definitely not a lot though)
dry pasta sparingly
dark chocolate sparingly (for fats)
my husband is a baker so sometimes they get treats as bits of homemade breads and cookies, always vegan.
They get other odds and ends too, sometimes a bit of dinner.

They're both in the 15 gal, got water etc and a cute nest built in a wicker basket. I was careful when introducing them, they already get along like sisters. Their personalities are so different--Dagny is an adventurous wild child, Luna is timid and mostly stays put, unless you spook her and then she's off like a rocket. I'd never considered getting rats, but they're very lovely, clean, friendly and smart.

Don't worry,I got another rat for the snake xD we also have three cats plus the cockatiel. Sounds like a lot, but I'm stay-at-home and my full time job is their care.

So, hi!

Edit; Forgot to mention, I'm aware that it would have been better to rescue/adopt rats rather than buy feeders. As I've said, they sort of surprised me

 

[Isamurat]

Hi and welcome to the forum

just a note of caution i would be careful with that diet. It is possible to make a healthy balanced home made diet (I've fed one for years) but it's also easier to get it wrong and have them short of key nutrients they need to thrive. Your diet looks very low in minimally processed carbs like whole grains, there will be some on the bird seed bit that will be too high in fat and seeds to give loads of balance. If you have a read of my website there's some good guidelines on making up your own grain mix. Whilst i wouldn't personally feed a vegan diet you can make a good one using pulsas for protien especially soya as it's complete. You will need to look into vit d, calcium and copper suppliments potentially