The only problem with our snake is that it refuses to eat anything but live mice. So, we have a routine, that every week or so we go to the pet store and buy one smallish female mouse to feed the snake immediately. This is very important so that we don't get attached to the tiny cute rodents.
However, Nick's mom works with someone who owns several snakes, and therefore breeds rats to feed them. Apparently all of this person's snakes went into hibernation just as the rats gave birth to a whole bunch of babies, so we were offered free rats to feed our snake.
Cool. However - the first rat we were given, although still young and small for a rat, was too big for our six month old ball python to eat. And after about twenty minutes of having it home it was too cute too. Enter baby rat number one.
We were given three more rats to feed our snake. One was a hairless variety just small enough for Indy to eat. The other two I was told not to look at because they were still extremely small and fuzzy and adorable. So I didn't look. The hairless one was dinner, the two babies were put into the rat cage for safe-keeping till Indy was hungry again.
This was a friday.
Saturday morning I woke up thinking I heard a squeaking. (The faint of heart should read no further.) After a few minutes I was quite positive I heard a squeaking and it was in our bedroom and it was fra
ntic. I dashed out of bed only to discover that one of the babies had escaped the cage (more on this later) and scurried into our bedroom where Rumpelstiltskitty found her. Rumpels did what all cats do and batted her around a bit and when we caught her was carrying the baby rat in her mouth. It was too late to save the rat.
To this day we have absolutely no idea how the rat got out of the cage. I know that animals can get out of areas that you would think are too small for them to manage, but this is incredible. It just isn't possible. So it's really unfortunate that the mysterious rat with teleportion abilities had to meet such a terrible end.
The good thing though is that a little bit later that morning Nick was sitting in my chair at my desk next to the rat cage holding the surviving baby. He's cradling it in his hands and looks up at me and says in a small voice: "So... can we keep her?"
Thus we now have to rats by accident. Their names are either Reep and Rose or Misao and Petra depending on who you ask and will probably end up some mixture of the two. And here are some pictures, though they are already growing like crazy. (Rather, there will be pictures as soon as blogger lets me load them)
Rumpels and the rats are friends now, by the way. She looks at them, and they look at her, and they all seem to enjoy the company.
However, Nick's mom works with someone who owns several snakes, and therefore breeds rats to feed them. Apparently all of this person's snakes went into hibernation just as the rats gave birth to a whole bunch of babies, so we were offered free rats to feed our snake.
Cool. However - the first rat we were given, although still young and small for a rat, was too big for our six month old ball python to eat. And after about twenty minutes of having it home it was too cute too. Enter baby rat number one.
We were given three more rats to feed our snake. One was a hairless variety just small enough for Indy to eat. The other two I was told not to look at because they were still extremely small and fuzzy and adorable. So I didn't look. The hairless one was dinner, the two babies were put into the rat cage for safe-keeping till Indy was hungry again.
This was a friday.
Saturday morning I woke up thinking I heard a squeaking. (The faint of heart should read no further.) After a few minutes I was quite positive I heard a squeaking and it was in our bedroom and it was fra
ntic. I dashed out of bed only to discover that one of the babies had escaped the cage (more on this later) and scurried into our bedroom where Rumpelstiltskitty found her. Rumpels did what all cats do and batted her around a bit and when we caught her was carrying the baby rat in her mouth. It was too late to save the rat.To this day we have absolutely no idea how the rat got out of the cage. I know that animals can get out of areas that you would think are too small for them to manage, but this is incredible. It just isn't possible. So it's really unfortunate that the mysterious rat with teleportion abilities had to meet such a terrible end.
The good thing though is that a little bit later that morning Nick was sitting in my chair at my desk next to the rat cage holding the surviving baby. He's cradling it in his hands and looks up at me and says in a small voice: "So... can we keep her?"
Thus we now have to rats by accident. Their names are either Reep and Rose or Misao and Petra depending on who you ask and will probably end up some mixture of the two. And here are some pictures, though they are already growing like crazy. (Rather, there will be pictures as soon as blogger lets me load them)
Rumpels and the rats are friends now, by the way. She looks at them, and they look at her, and they all seem to enjoy the company.
2 comments:
i told you... i'd compromise with Rose for the elder and Misao for the younger.
But Reep & Rose sound so GOOD together! And the title of your post makes me giggle.
oh happy hippos, hopping on tiptoe, frolicking about our zooooo
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