A blog about Skip's and Alxandra's pets. The rittles are pet rats. Bittle is our Catahoula Leopard mutt. And, my crafting which is mostly for the rittles.
Rose as a baby. She's the beige hooded. She, later, became a Siamese.
Rose passed in her sleep last night after a prolonged battle with pneumonia, the same pneumonia that troubled Mabel. Despite hand feeding and antibiotics and theophylline, Rose just did not gain weight, and our vet had cautioned us that she was just not going to recover.
Sweet Rose doing what she loved, hanging out in a sleeve.
Rose with her sister, Martha.
Rose was always a shy rat, and she had struggled with skin irritation and a breast lump. Since we'd switched to a wheat free diet, she'd been much more assertive and active and her rash improved, but then, the pneumonia.
She will be joining Curly, Doctor #1, and Gwen at the rainbow bridge.
As you may have read in my blog, Mabel has recently recovered from a severe bout of pneumonia. On the other hand, Rose... Rose had a much milder bout of pneumonia and she just hasn't bounced back. Last week, her vet informed us that Rose wasn't likely to recover. There's very little air movement in her lungs. She's back on 2 antibiotics and theophylline, and she's supposed to receive albuterol twice per day, but we stopped that because it was too traumatic for her. However, if Mabel starts wheezing, we can give her two puffs of albuterol, and Mabel stops wheezing.
Rose's weight is plummeting. She actually weighs less than Mabel. And, Mabel is our smallest rat.
Here's an older photo of Rose. Yeah, she's our Siamese rat. Unfortunately, Rose is cyanotic most of the time now. So, I'm sparing you a photo.
Today, though, she's been more chipper. She's been very energetic, hanging out in various hammocks and the cube. We hand feed her every time we go by the cage. I'm hoping that her increased energy is a good sign, but her vet did tell us not to expect recovery.
Here's a recent photo of Mabel grooming one of our blondies. She's gaining weight beautifully. The doctor was totally surprised that she survived never mind that she's recovering, but she's expected to remain on theophylline for life, but she's doing great off all antibiotics.
(Note: Mabel is a rat with the rex mutation which gives her curly whiskers and fur, but she also has hair loss. Her fur grows in and then, falls out in patches.)
By the way, I'd been working with her on charging the clicker for several days. And, unfortunately, she had a lung exacerbation, so she took a break from training for a few days. So, the first part of the video is from her first session after she returned to training, and the next day, she was just an extremely bright pupil and learned the spin, which is what you see in the second part of the video.
Also, Mabel saw her doctor yesterday. The doctor was thrilled that she's gained 50 grams since her pneumonia, but she still has lung issues, so she's going to be on theophylline for the rest of her life which reallybums me out. But, we just will have to deal with it. At least, she likes the taste of theophylline.
And, on the subject of medicating rats, Dean has just been started on Bactrim for a secondary infection of contact dermatitis. And, Skip Lee was thrilled to report (Skip is just amazing at medicating rats, so he gets to do all of it --grins-- ) that Dean avidly reached for the syringe when he clicked, and Dean drank all of his Bactrim quick as can be. A couple of weeks ago, I'd done a few clicker training sessions with him. This is a wonderful consequence of clicker training, easy medication administration.
Now, I need to figure out what Dean is allergic to. Hopefully, it was a one time issue. My rats are all on a gluten free diet because of Rose's sensitivity, so it's not wheat.
Does anyone know what the most prevalent rat allergies are other than wheat?
