Your rats' primary pleasure in life is eating. Be sure they get healthy and exciting foods that will make them dance and sing! With just a very few exceptions, what is healthy for you is healthy for your rats. And with just a little planning and a properly-stocked freezer and pantry, their dinner time can be one of the highlights of your day, as well. When was the last time you saw someone go into paroxysms of joy over a bowl of steamed broccoli or a handful of dried pasta? It does the heart good to see it!
Always on offer in every cage:
Fresh water in a rodent bottle, rinsed and refilled daily to avoid staleness and bacteria. If you wouldn't drink it, your rat shouldn't be forced to drink it, either. They get most the same bugs from contaminated water that we do.
Quality rat lab block with a protein content of less than 18% and lacking alfalfa as an ingredient. Dovetail feeds Native Earth, a Harlan Teklab product available on line for less than $40 for a 40 lb. bag, including shipping to your doorstep.
Pregnant and nursing mothers and rats under the age of four months receive a mix of 80% Native Earth lab block and 20% high quality dried dog food to raise the amount of protein in their diets. Beyond youth and adolescence, a higher protein diet will shorten the lifespan of your rat. Their protein needs are far lower than those of humans, dogs and cats, and most other rodents.
An important note about lab block: Lab block advertised as being appropriate for rats varies vastly in quality and healthfulness. In few, the vast majority of "rat and mouse" foods available in major pet supply chains are either garbage or just bloody expensive. If you must obtain your staple rat diet from a retail store, spend just a bit more and go for that which is slightly more expensive over high-priced garbage. In a pinch, Dovetail will feed Regal Rat, for which we pay around $12 for a three pound bag, but we hate ourselves for doing it and have to feed the humans in the family ramen and peanut butter for a week to make up the expense. :-(
An important note about loose rat and mouse mixes: Any "rat food" consisting of loose seeds and unidentifiable dogfood-like chunks is junk food, full of empty calories, fat, food coloring, and quite possibly dangerous molds and fungi residing in the dried seed corn that usually comes in this sort of mix and is nutritionally worthless. These foods can only be offered as "treats," or you will have a fat yet undernourished rat who poops A LOT.
Trust us, when it comes to treats, a few unsalted peanuts in the hull, a tablespoon of canned tuna, a little dish of fresh broccoli, or a dollop of yogurt will win out over this processed garbage every time and at a fraction of the cost. Demand better for your rat.
In addition, Dovetail rats scarf down ample daily servings from among these fresh fruits and vegetables:
Broccoli, lightly blanched or steamed or occasionally raw
Carrot sticks
Sweet potatoes, microwaved, boiled or roasted (NEVER RAW)
Green Beans, blanched or steamed
Summer squash, lightly cooked
Bok choy, chopped raw or cooked - a rattie favorite!
Pumpkin or winter squash, microwaved or roasted
Sweet Peas, fresh or lightly cooked
Sprouts - fresh and freshly washed
Spinach, collards, or mustard greens in moderation, fresh leaves or chopped and lightly cooked
Beets, roasted and chopped, or beet greens, lightly steamed and chopped
Corn on the cob without butter, cooked
Salad greens or mixed mesclun - wash carefully
Cabbage, fresh or lightly cooked
Avocado
Tomatoes, chopped fresh or straight from a can without additives or spices
Celery, preferably with leafy green tops
(Cooked vegetables should be prepared without butter, salt, pepper, or other seasonings.)
Apples
Pears
Plums
Bananas
Blueberries
Melons of all descriptions, sliced in their skins
Strawberries
Blackberries, Raspberries, Boysenberries, or Huckleberries
Crab apples
Mangos and mango seeds for gnawing
Papayas
(Fruit can be chopped or sliced fresh or frozen and lightly thawed to create delightful ratsicles!)
Plus small daily servings from among the following cereals:
Whole wheat pasta, cooked or uncooked
Multi-grain Cheerios or other whole grain breakfast cereal in moderation
Brown rice, cooked or uncooked
Steel cut oats, cooked or uncooked
Whole grain bread cubes
Cooked breakfast cereals such as Malt-o-meal or Cream of Wheat, plain or sweetened with fruit
With occasional treats, once or twice a week, from among the following:
Greek Yogurt
Unsalted Pop Corn
Lean cooked (not fried) chicken or fish in small quantities
Cooked fresh bones: chicken, beef, pork, or lamb (remove within 24 hours), one per rat at least or you will have a hell of a fight on your hands!
Low fat cottage cheese
Vegetable juice
Healthier soups or stews (avoid spicy, fatty, or overly salty dishes)
Extra-crunchy dog biscuits, broken into manageable pieces
And on rare occasion, a wicked indulgence or all-out bribe for good behavior:
Roasted, unsalted peanuts, in the hull or loose from your hand, three or four nuts per rat
Rat Yogies. Cheese or peanut butter flavors are the house favorites. One or two per rat
Tiny marshmallow or chocolate baking chip, one - we repeat one - per rat
Pumpkin or sunflower seeds in the shell, several seeds per rat
Low fat cream cheese, wee bites of it, generally offered as a bribe during photo shoots
Whole mixed nuts in the shell - gnawing them open is half the fun! Rinse thoroughly first.
A wee nibble of that cheese pizza, spaghetti, or macaroni and cheese left over from dinner that you probably shouldn't be eating, either!
Tiny dollop of ice cream, ditto
Rats don't need additional fat, salt, protein, sugar, or capsicum (hot peppers) in their diet. Leave off the candy and potato chips, etc. and strictly limit all of the above in your rats' diet. With apologies to all those fabulously squishy bucks out there, a fat rat is an unhealthy rat, one that is far more prone to abscesses, bumblefoot, respiratory distress, heart disease, diabetes, and stroke!
NEVER, EVER FEED YOUR RAT ANY OF THE FOLLOWING:
Carbonated beverages - your rats can't burp!
Alcohol - rats have such high metabolic rates that they skip the giddy phase and go straight into alcohol poisoning. If you think it would be fun to "get the rat drunk," just hand it some rat poison and be done with it!
Raw dry beans or raw peanuts - contain antinutrients that destroy vitamin A and enzymes needed to digest protein and starches, and causes red blood cells to clump. Roasted peanuts are fine.
Raw sweet potato—contains compounds that form cyanide in the stomach. Cooked sweet potato is fine. In fact, it is one of the very best things you can feed your rats, particularly if they are feeling poorly and need something yummy and nutritious.
Green bananas—inhibits starch-digesting enzymes. Bad idea.
Green potato skins and eyes—contain solanine, a toxin
Wild insects—can carry internal parasites and diseases. Maybe limit outdoor exercise if it's your area's year for the 17 year locusts
Raw bulk tofu—can contain bacteria; packaged raw tofu is safe
Orange juice—forbidden for male rats only, d-limonene in the skin oil, which gets into the orange juice during squeezing, can cause kidney damage and kidney cancer due to a protein that only male rats have in their kidneys. Pieces of the orange fruit are okay if you wash the orange-skin oil off of it after peeling it.
Spoiled or moldy food of any sort, raw meat, or raw eggs - rats are just as susceptible to botulism and salmonella as humans are, and you never want a rat with diarrhea...it's not a pretty sight!