Eva's Rat FAQ

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Obtaining and caring for Rats

QUESTION: What is the perfect breeding rat male like?

ANSWER: There is three important issues to consider when choosing a male for breeding purposes:

Temperament! A male that does not live together with other males without any signs of fights is just not suitable (you don't want the babies to bite do you?).
Age! Any bad behaviour (biting humans or cagemates) usually shows up before the male is 1 year old so he should be at least 1 year old to be sure he has a good temperament to pass on to his babies. I actually know of one male that suddenly turned aggressive at the age of 1 year and 2 weeks old, otherwise this usually happens around the age of 7 months.
Health! Don't breed from sick rats. Actually you'd better not even breed from a male that has been sick either...

Here in Sweden we have seen many rats becoming biters - biting humans (including children) and killing cagemates. And it is a fact that this is a genetic problem. This is not a problem just with Swedish rats, we see the same problems with rats imported from England, Finland, Germany, Netherlands, USA and so on.