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Hello Hello,
I am a brand new rat mom to two baby dumbo girls. I love them so much, my heart melts basically every time I see them. The two girls are, I would suppose, sisters, but have very different tendencies. They always cuddle (and when I mean always I really do mean always) and I worry that if I ever take one out to play with the other, the other will get lonely. In reality, the other one usually climbs up to see what's going on and goes to sleep. Sometimes I hear vocalizations and see them staring at each other through the glass. It makes me feel as if I've done something wrong...until they quickly turn around and start ignoring each other again and the one in the cage goes back to sleep.
Is it okay to play with my girls one at a time for extended periods? I'm talking anywhere from twenty minutes to an hour and a half or so for each girl, each time. I feel bad ever depriving them of each other because I know they're never to be housed alone. That being said, is it okay for me to play with each rat individually? It seems to be the easiest option. I let them free roam together every day, but my girls have two very different personalities. Daisy likes to climb all over me and hide in my sleeves, while trying to keep Millie out of trouble (and eventually get her back into the cage) is like roping cattle in the rodeo. If Millie gets out of my reach and I move, Daisy's human tree becomes disrupted and she will slide down one of my limbs as an escape route, which scares me to death. It's very hard to handle them free roaming at the same time because one always wants to relax and the other wants to escape to another part of the room entirely. She has to be heavily supervised as she explores because she is certainly very curious. Following Daisy is like getting a workout in every part of your body that attempts to move quickly while you are staying close to the ground.
Daisy LOVES to be held. She is just super receptive to touch and will let you do almost anything to her and groom your hand whist you are doing it. Millie, on the other hand, freaks out greatly. While Daisy enjoys resting in the crook of my elbow, I can only keep Millie chill in the bonding pouch I made, and only when Daisy is not present. I feel kind of bad, because since Daisy is just so easily bonded with me I will just pick her up and watch TV with her in my lap until she falls asleep. Millie will have nothing to do with this and will generally release her bowels in a tall pyramid formation if I try. Will spending more time bonding closely with Daisy as opposed to supervising independent Millie make this worse? Granted, it's literally only been three days. I got my rats on Thursday. Daisy took to me instantly. I think that Millie is warming up to me, but she's generally more skittish. I'm just worried that because our connection wasn't as immediate as the other that this could pose some strange problem later on. I just want to give her the best possible life she can have. I don't want to bias myself against her in any way because I have so much room in my heart for her. I want to go with her flow, but I hope that by seeing her behavior I don't make some sort of assumption about her potential that actually disrupts her flow, if you get what I'm saying?
I am a brand new rat mom to two baby dumbo girls. I love them so much, my heart melts basically every time I see them. The two girls are, I would suppose, sisters, but have very different tendencies. They always cuddle (and when I mean always I really do mean always) and I worry that if I ever take one out to play with the other, the other will get lonely. In reality, the other one usually climbs up to see what's going on and goes to sleep. Sometimes I hear vocalizations and see them staring at each other through the glass. It makes me feel as if I've done something wrong...until they quickly turn around and start ignoring each other again and the one in the cage goes back to sleep.
Is it okay to play with my girls one at a time for extended periods? I'm talking anywhere from twenty minutes to an hour and a half or so for each girl, each time. I feel bad ever depriving them of each other because I know they're never to be housed alone. That being said, is it okay for me to play with each rat individually? It seems to be the easiest option. I let them free roam together every day, but my girls have two very different personalities. Daisy likes to climb all over me and hide in my sleeves, while trying to keep Millie out of trouble (and eventually get her back into the cage) is like roping cattle in the rodeo. If Millie gets out of my reach and I move, Daisy's human tree becomes disrupted and she will slide down one of my limbs as an escape route, which scares me to death. It's very hard to handle them free roaming at the same time because one always wants to relax and the other wants to escape to another part of the room entirely. She has to be heavily supervised as she explores because she is certainly very curious. Following Daisy is like getting a workout in every part of your body that attempts to move quickly while you are staying close to the ground.
Daisy LOVES to be held. She is just super receptive to touch and will let you do almost anything to her and groom your hand whist you are doing it. Millie, on the other hand, freaks out greatly. While Daisy enjoys resting in the crook of my elbow, I can only keep Millie chill in the bonding pouch I made, and only when Daisy is not present. I feel kind of bad, because since Daisy is just so easily bonded with me I will just pick her up and watch TV with her in my lap until she falls asleep. Millie will have nothing to do with this and will generally release her bowels in a tall pyramid formation if I try. Will spending more time bonding closely with Daisy as opposed to supervising independent Millie make this worse? Granted, it's literally only been three days. I got my rats on Thursday. Daisy took to me instantly. I think that Millie is warming up to me, but she's generally more skittish. I'm just worried that because our connection wasn't as immediate as the other that this could pose some strange problem later on. I just want to give her the best possible life she can have. I don't want to bias myself against her in any way because I have so much room in my heart for her. I want to go with her flow, but I hope that by seeing her behavior I don't make some sort of assumption about her potential that actually disrupts her flow, if you get what I'm saying?