Aladdin-Do The Rat Thing (Part 3 of 3)

Here is the final installment. Hope that you enjoyed "Do The Rat Thing."

Here it is: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gp9g8izsAFI&feature=related

Aladdin-Do The Rat Thing (Part 2 of 3)

I hope you liked the first installment. Enjoy the second!

Here it is: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_8sdZfh2wZw

Aladdin-Do The Rat Thing (Part 1 of 3)

Do you remember the Aladdin cartoon on Disney Toon? Well enjoy an episode where Jasmine gets inspiration from a rat running around the palace to better understand Aladdin's life as a "Street Rat." Look for the next installment sometime soon! Enjoy!

Here it is: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s6EES9LcgR4

Rats Laugh When You Tickle Them!

I saw this video before and just happened upon it again. It is so cute and interesting!

Check it out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=myuceywaOUs

My rats will not let me anywhere near their bellies to let me tickle them.

Jack Black (rat catcher)

Here is your history lesson for the day!

Jack Black was a rat-catcher and mole destroyer by appointment to Her Majesty Queen Victoria during the middle of the nineteenth century. Black cut a striking figure in his self-made "uniform" of scarlet topcoat, waistcoat, and breeches, with a huge leather belt inset with cast-iron rats.

He is known particularly through Henry Mayhew's account in London Labour and the London Poor, Vol. 3, where he tells Mayhew of his work and experiences, including a number of occasions when he nearly died from infection following rat bites.

When he caught any unusually coloured rats, he bred them, to establish new colour varieties. He would sell his home-bred domesticated coloured rats as pets, mainly, as Black observed, "to well-bred young ladies to keep in squirrel cages." Beatrix Potter is believed to have been one of his customers, and she dedicated the book Samuel Whiskers to her rat of the same name. The more sophisticated ladies of court kept their rats in dainty gilded cages, and even Queen Victoria herself kept a rat or two. It was in this way that domesticated—or fancy—rats were established. Black also supplied live rats for rat-baiting in pits, a popular mid-Victorian past-time.

Black had a number of sidelines beyond rats, including fishing (for food and supplying aquaria), bird catching and taxidermy. He was also an accomplished dog breeder. He told Mayhew: "I had a little rat dog—a black tan terrier by the name of Billy which was the greatest stock dog in London of that day. He was the father of the greatest portion of small black tan dogs in London now. I've been offered a sovereign per pound (in weight) for some of my little terriers, but I wouldn't take that price, for they weren't heavier than two or three pounds. I once sold one of the dogs to the Austrian Ambassador...My terrier dog was known to all the London fancy. As rat-killing dogs, there's no equal to that strain of black tan terriers."

And you thought Jack Black was an actor and singer in Tenacious D!

Sprague-Dawley Rats

While watching a Modern Marvels special on Rats I learned that my rats are officially named as Sprague-Dawleys. This type of rat is an inbred strain of albino rat commonly used in laboratory research. There are 12 strains of inbred rats listed under “Medical Subject Headings,” a supplement to Index Medicus. The Wistar rat is an equally popular inbred strain of albino rat used in laboratory research.

It is comforting to know that my little guys were saved from scientific experimentation and the belly of a snake.

Rat Trivia

Rats eat about one-tenth their body weight each day. if that held true for people the average adult would need to eat about 15 pounds of food a day.

Since the 1950s, Alberta, Canada has been rat free due to a strict rat control program. Even pet rats are not allowed in the Canadian province.

The oldest rat on record lived for seven years and four months. That is almost three times the lifspan of the average rat.

The rat genome revealed that rats have been evolving about three times faster than humas.

Rats memorize their environment by body and muscle movement alone. They become so engrained by body movements that when objects are removed from their territory rats will continue to move around them as if the objects were still there.

The phrase: "Rats are the first to desert a sinking ship" has some basis in fact. In the days of wooden sailing vessels, rats lived in the holds of the ships and would be the first to know if a leak had developed. Ironically, their incessant gnawing in the wood often caused the leaks.

Rats can swim as far as 1/2 mile in open water.

New Home!

One of our neighbors moved out and left what seemed to us to be a treasure trove of items. Tim and I are not dumpster divers by any means, but if you could have seen what this guy threw out I believe you would have been so moved to do what Tim and I did. One item in particular caught our attention--a bird cage on wheels. I am not talking about a little flimsy cage for canaries, I am talking about a cage big enough to house a large parrot. Now this interested us how you may ask, but keep reading.

After having our rats for two weeks, we witnessed a significant growth. What once seemed to be a perfectly sized cage began to look stifling to the guys. We read that a big cage with lots of space to run and lots of stuff to do is best for healthy rats. Tim and I were concerned because we entered the whole situation because owning rats was supposedly inexpensive, but then we saw the price of large rat cages. It would have been a big investment, but one we were considering for Monkey and Steve's happiness and health. Well then our neighbor moved out and left this huge bird cage behind.

It was a sign! Tim brought it in, scrubbed it down, and made it rat friendly. We looked up the value of the cage online and found that this guy discarded a $500.00 cage. Thanks to this guy, we saved a lot of money and were able to give the rats a better home. We are currently tricking the cage out to make it rat paradise, but this will come in small increments considering our finances.

The guys seem a lot happier and have more room to run and I cannot wait till their cage is complete! Hopefully by the end of the semester it will be and I can post a few pictures of their fully renovated abode!