My babies opened their eyes on Christmas!!! And Honey now has two foster pups too!

[luckies4me]

Well my baby ratties opened thier eyes on Christmas day! Isn't that just too cool? AND I did something very bad, but I am sorry I just could not let these poor innocent babies sit in that pet shop anymore!!! I went to Scamps and my god how discusting they are. And I know first hand considering I used to work there. What the heck was I thinking working THERE?

I went in there to count the many different things I could find wrong that day like I normally do and in one 10 gallon tank they had a doe, no more than 7 frickin weeks with babies! She was so stressed the babies hadn't been nursed and they were all starving. So I went to go talk to the stupid girl who works there and told her I wanted to take the babies. She threw a fit and said they couldn't sell babies, well I DON"T CARE! They were going home with ME, period. No matter if I had to break the case and take them myself.

I explained to her that I bred rats, and had years of experience doing so, and this was just not right. I told her the babies would have a better chance if they came home with me and I gave them to Honey to nurse. I told them I had a lactating doe who would gladly take these poor babies in. SHE MADE ME BUY THEM! For two bucks each. I would have taken the mom and all the babies, but I withheld tears and didn't do it. I took the two babies (highwhites) that I knew I could easily place and the ones who had risk for megacolon. I knew if they developed megacolon the store would just throw them in the freezer that all the other crappy petshops. BRB continue in another post so I don't lose this.

[luckies4me]

So anyways, I bought the babies and left. Then yesterday I went back to the mall to check on the remaining pups. Three left but looking a tad bit better...................BUT........get this!!! In one 15 gallon tank I saw 16 does with literally around 30 babies all of different ages scattered around the tank. Some were not being kept warm or nursed. I was so pissed off I immediately went and told three store employees. Instead of worrying about the animals and taking care of them they were at the back gossiping. Cages hadn't been clean for at least weeks. The bedding was soaked with urine and scattered with feces. It was so discusting. I wanted to punch those girls in the face so hard. All they said was that they gather them up when they want to nurse them etc. Stupid MORONS! Do they not realize that pinkies cannot keep themselves warm????

So anyways, Honey took these babies in just like I thought, no problem. Now they have gained so much weight and their eyes should be open soon. They are so adorable. They are LUCKY rats, as they would have been pregnant in a few short weeks, and left to live the life of a petstore breeder.

Tomorrow I plan on going to the shop and taking TONS of paperwork explaining everything about rats and how what they are doing is wrong. I will also give them educational handouts and pages that explain why males and females should be kept seperate etc. AND I am also allerting BOB, the Northwest Supervisor about these girls slacking.

And as much as I hate PETA I will be allering them about this petshop and all Scamps in Oregon. I will make sure they are shut down or at least clean up their store. I am also thinking about petitioning them too, and standing out there with signs. I'll do it, I swear. I really will. They have stepped over the line this time and there is no turning back.

[Amber]

Wow Cassie, Im glad for what you are doing for these babies. Shame on that petshop, do all that you can to stop the petstore! I cant believe how they are keeping them! poor ratties...

[GoldenRetrLuver]

Wow Cass. I really admire you. STUPID GIRLS! I'm glad you were able to take them. Poor ratties.

[magcpen]

That's an amazing thing you're doing. I know I couldn't do it, and I know the babies are so grateful to be able to nurse and be kept warm. All I can say now is....

GO CASS!!!!!!!!!

[green_chameleon_girl]

YAY!!!

[luckies4me]

Thanks everyone. Here are some pics of the new babies. The first one is a before pic, the day I first got them. Notice how skinny they are, and how their skin was all flaky and grose.

[luckies4me]

And here is the after pic just taken today. They look a lot healthier, the flakes are gone and they have more hair and weight on them.

[green_chameleon_girl]

AWW they are beautiful! Congrats on making them healthier(sp?) then those losers did

[trayi52]

When you first got them, they were all head, now their bodies have grown to fit their heads. Poor little babies, its a good thing you got them. They just look so much better. Good job Cass.

Willie

[shais_mom]

Good for you standing up for what you believe in!!!
Give yourself a hug from me!!
And its amazing how different they look in just a couple days.

[luckies4me]

Thanks.


What's funny is that I haven't had standard ear babies in so long, that they look really funny with those pointed ears lol. But they are so cute. They are both dalmations, which is my favorite marking. I want to keep the female (capped head with splotches on the back) as she has really nice markings. And I adore the boy, but I have too many boys. I'll probably end up keeping him anyway.............I do that most of the time lol.

[Desert Arabian]

Cass, I feel your pain, when it comes to pet stores abusing their animals. There in a pet store near my house, in Milwaukee, this place is huge!! It's called Hoffer's Tropical Life Pets. I love the store for the fact that it is so huge, I could spend hours browsing around and daydreaming about tons of stuff. They have a small animal section, and they have to have AT LEAST 150 rats. There are about 25 aquariums with anywhere from two to 25 rats in one tank. All of the tanks have nursing does in there with pinkies. In the tank along with the does and pups are her previous litter/s and the buck! They have just about every color you could imagine, including hairless rats.

It really makes me sad when I see all those rats crammed into one tank. It grosses me out to think that all those rats are incest and sisters and brothers breed. S-I-C-K.

One thing that really disturbed me is the animals kept away from the customers view. When my friend and I were there a couple of weeks ago, a man and his kids came in and bought a rat- these people were *so* stupid...anyways...so a worker goes in the backroom to get the rat out of the tank. My friend and I watch the worker pick the rat up by the tail and carry it back through the door over to the people. It gets even more sick....the worker forgot to put the cloth backdrop down- so we could see through the glass into the backroom. To our horror there are cages stacked about three high full of chinchillas, kittens, rats, you name it. They are in a dark room, never given any attention, and their living conditions are HORRENDUS. I was ready to cry when I saw those animals. It hit me really hard, because you'd never expect such a modest up-scale looking pet store to do that.

I feel so bad now that I saw that. I never really was disgusted with the pet store before I saw the backroom. Now that I saw the backroom, I am really disgusted- they can do better than that. I mean Hoffer's is not your little local pet store with some occasional products. Hoffer's has every single pet product imaginable, the store is HUGE...you have to see this place...it is the Prada of pet stores. It's a shame such a posh pet store doesn't care for its animals to well.

[luckies4me]

I know, it makes me sick. But one thing I wanted to mention is that sometimes inbreeding is good. It's how you lock in traits, but you have to be careful. A lot of our colors and markings wouldn't be around unless animals were inbred to lock those genetics. It's a good way to bring out colors, certain body type, keep personality traits etc. So it's not bad all the time. But for people who have no experience and they keep breeding over and over and over, then it causes major problems and can bring out undesirable traits such as propensity to tumours, myco flareups etc.


I really cannot stand petshops anymore. It just makes me boil.


Oh guess what?!!!!


IT'S SNOWING HERE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! YAY!

[amoore]

I would say those cute little raties are in good hands now with you looking after them.

I admire you for standing up for what you believe! You are a good person.

I like their colors too.