About me and my rats too!

- Critter City

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CRITTER CITY
BY SANDRA CONTI- TODD OF ALLEXPERTS.COM

ABOUT ME AND MY RATS TOO!

Sandra Todd
Lake Wylie, SC ( First small town located outside the city of Charlotte, NC) My mission is to educate the rat owner and help guide them to help maintain the rats overhaul health and well being. The need to educate rat owners about the importance of quarantine (http://www.freewebs.com/crittercity/thequarantinepage.htm) for example and the devastating effects that ignoring quarantine can have on an entire colony of rats is dedicated to an entire page of its own simply called The quarantine page. Also, various rat illnesses are discussed, mostly ones that are more common during the rats life, as well as discussing proper nutrition and care of the geriatric rat. I continue to grow in my knowledge as I dedicate alot of my free time studying about rat ailments and other areas and also refer to my own vet who is a fantastic exotics specialist in my area and is always eager to answer some of my many questions. I also have provided various Vet clinics with information on rat care, much of it taken from this site, and many of the clinics that I supply have come back for more. This makes it worth all the extra effort; to get the word out on proper care of these little animals.

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Please take the time to read over my site and I hope you enjoy it. I tried to keep the atmosphere of this site less clinical and more personal to help people better understand. If you have any questions or would like to contribute to this site with any information regarding rat care, that would be really great. If you have photos to share along with personal stories etc...again, feel free to email me but put in the subject line something to let me know you are a "Critter City" visitor so I dont toss it in the SPAM pile. My email is: S (mailto:SandraContiTodd@yahoo.com)andralynnTodd@yahoo.com Owning a pet of any species means there will always be a chance that you will have to see a vet at one point during their lives. To deny them medical treatment when needed is cruel, so if you cannot afford vet care, please reconsider buying a pet until you can provide for it everything it needs to live a happy and healthy life. My goal is to provide a website for rat owners that is accurate and complete so our rats get the best care possible.

I have loved and lost many many rats over the years. Too many to count actually. Here are just some of the rats that I have loved and lost over the years. I have one page still up dedicated to the rats that I just lost in the spring of 2011 and since that time I have three wonderful new boys, Riley, Finley and Cobie.

MY CURRENT BOYS Born May 2011

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Rats lost, my heart will forever ache for the loss of each and every one of my rats:

My boy Santana, with his one eye missing!

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Santana at Christmas, December 2008 !

Here is the cage Santana used to share with three of his brothers, he has the huge Ferret Nation all to himself now. Its impossible to keep it all pretty with the matching fleece floors since Santana likes to rearragne things alot!

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He is deeply missed.

Smudge, 2007, before he lost his vision.

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This is Sir Bo, my grand rat taken December 2008. Bo lived to be 3 weeks past his 4th birthday and to date, is the oldest rat I have had. Bo was born May 1, 2005 and passed away May 23, 2009. He is sadly missed.

Old man Bo, 3 years old here. Always had lots of porphyrin around his nose even though he wasnt sick.

This is my beloved Templeton who passed away December 2008 at the age of 3 years and 6 months. He was the brother of Santana, my one eyed boy. He loved to take his meds and even helped by holding the syringe and licking the medication out of it!

I have loved and lost over 50 rats through the years. Sadly I do not have photos of every single rat I have ever owned, but I do have some to share here with everyone so those of you can see some of my past wonderful rats that have brought me joy over the years and have also taught me so much about rats just from observation

http://www.sandyscrittercity.com/aboutmeandmyratstoo.htm

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alone!

It all began in a little family owned Pet store. I was out planning on buying either gerbils or mice when I saw two big giant critters running around the pet store. They were up on the counter where the cash register sat. They came right over to me and wanted my attention. I remember one of the larger ones reached up and pawed at me almost like he was asking me to pet him. That was Patterson and Ferman, two rats that I came to adopt two years later when the pet store was closing down and they were getting rid of everything, including the two pet store rats! I had the pleasure of loving Ferman for a few months after I adopted them only to lose him to a after his third birthday! Here is Patterson. Sadly I do not have a photo of Ferman, but he was a large black berkshire.

Where it all started: My first two rats!

My precious Louie, who was my very first rat!

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Louies brother, Mr. Jingles. I only bought Louie at first because I was not sure if I was allergic to rats or not. Once I found out I had just a slight reaction, I was anxious to go back and hopefully buy a rat that was from the same litter as Louie. I was so happy to find out that Mr. Jingles was available. He was awesome!

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My Sweet tiny Charlotte March 2002- May 6th, 2005 Charlotte! She gave me a surprise litter a week after I rescued her and gave birth to 15 pups! Charlotte earned her wings and halo at 3 years, 3 months of age. She was tiny but mighty and the boss of her cage!

Hairy, my FUGS boy! He has his own page here on Critter City. Please refer to WHAT IS A FUGS? (http://www.freewebs.com/crittercity/whatintheworldisafugs.htm)

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Pitter and Patter, Oreo's babies!

Shadow and his cage mate, Patches!!!!!

My little wild hybrid, Holly. She was much smaller than any domestic I have ever had!

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Holly again!

My sweet Peanut! He was a loud bruxer!!

Casper! Charlottes baby and one of the pups that I watched grow from birth till he earned his halo and wings.

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Oreo! Lived to be well over 3 years old. I rescued her and she gave me a surprise litter of 7 babies!

Skittles! He was always sporting a porphyrin nose from day one! He was from a group of lab rats I rescued from a Vet school. He was pretty

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aggressive and was a biter, but I still loved him from a distance!

Bingo and Fermie! Two of Oreos pups all grown up!

Socrates!! Twin brother of Santana, my one eyed boy! Socs left us with a broken heart in the spring of 2008!

Several years ago I rescued a group of four lab rats that came from a Vet school. They were to be euthanized if they were not adopted out. There were at least 60 rodents in need of homes or they would face death. The four big boys I had were Mr.Magoo, Skittles, Twizzler and Clayton. Clayton was named after Clay Aiken (my daughter loved him, I am NOT a fan....LOL) so that tells you how long ago that was, which if my memory is right, about 2003 I think. I used non toxic colored marker on the base of their tail to identify who was who since they were all jumbo sized PEWS. They were all pretty skittish and did not like me much until they became ill and wanted comforting. I didnt mind that they were not real keen on being held etc...and even took a few good bites from them, because they had a pretty lousy first year of life being a lab rat !

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Griffin, the white rex, and his beauty of a brother, Dodger, were my first rats that were from a hobby breeder. Sweet and tiny, they were the most wonderful boys ever and they never fought with each other, not even play fight. They would chase each other and tumble around but not once did they ever scrap, which is unusual to say when its regarding rat pups! When Dodger passed away, Griffin died shortly after from a broken heart. Yes, it really can happen, and in fact this was not my first rat to die from a broken herat. He was my third. Dying from a broken heart simply means the rat had become depressed to the point the immune system weakens and if the rat falls ill, they usually cannt fight off infection well and they pass away. Its very sad but very true. Submit

Critter City 2004 Webmaster: Sandra Conti-Todd All rights reserved.

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