For Day Four of our launch week we are pleased to release a beautiful video that tells the story of two funny rat boys who were rehomed last year from a research facility.
Brothers Pepper and Mint are having the time of their lives in their new home and their wonderful mum Patrina and dad Chris have built them a bioactive cage with a deep digging box.
Needless to say the boys spend most of their time “underground”. It’s really worth considering a digging box for your rats and mice as burrowing, digging, tunnelling and foraging are all part of their natural behaviours.
You can watch the video here.
When we went to visit Pepper and Mint they had been in their new home for a few months and were well and truly settled in. Patrina says they love their food and have a taste for mashed potato with a bit of cheese.
They were certainly happy to come out and say hello and let us film them interacting with mum and jumping all over the lounge.
While they were a bit timid at first, Patrina says patience has paid off, just spending time at the cage talking to them and patting them has won them over as well as plenty of tasty treats.
A bioactive cage is one that includes natural substrate like coconut or peat coir (which you can buy cheaply online or from Bunnings) and other natural elements like sticks, bark and plants. You introduce bugs into the substrate such as isopods (which you can also buy online) that keep it clean for a period of time.
You can find out more at the Naturalistic and Bioactive Rat Setups group on Facebook, which offers some great tutorials and guidelines on setting up a cage.
We also managed to capture something very special on film – Pepper’s first brux! What an honour.
Thank you Patrina and Chris for providing such a great home for the boys and showering them with love.
