picking up rats

[wulfyskingdom]

Those are some very cute photos, I'm glad to hear the yoghurt has worked. I find my big shy boy doesnt like climbing onto my arms/shoulder unless I have a jumper on so he can get a nice grip on, I will coax him out with a little piece of dark chocolate, once he's completely out of the cage i carefully walk over to their play area, and give him the choice of running down my arm to hop off. He gets out now without any food and he's a real sweet heart, but is just very awkward at being picked up, before him I've only had one other rat like that.

With your guys being young, they shouldnt be at a stage where their bodies might get arkward or stiff when they are picked up, i would say it's just nerves.

They look like they're 2-3 months old, so they are probably just unused to humans at the moment and full of nervous/playful baby rat energy so dont worry too much if they arent snuggly or cuddly for a while.

[sublimity]

I figured they were pretty young when we got them a month ago although Pepper seems to have had a growth spurt and grown lengthways a lot.

They dont really go stiff, Henry is quite tame in comparison to Pepper. Henry quite happily likes to be held but does seem very curious about everything. You can hold him on the palm of your hand and he will sit relatively still or slowly try to crawl up your arm. Pepper on the other hand.. when you hold him he just struggles to get out and we did loosen our grip on him twice before and each time he just flew out of our hands and jumped to the floor. Then we spent the next 5mins trying to steer him towards the cage.

Hopefully the yogurt thing will work a treat and over time they will become even friendlier. Jackson (my son) is very excited and wants to eventually teach them some tricks... hes been researching them on youtube

The dont seem too active atm, well at least when we are in the room They seem to love their ferret tunnel and are always sleeping in their. But yes whenever we go in the room if they are out or down the bottom of their cage they usually freeze and then run back to the safety of their tunnel.