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Training Your Pet Rat by Gerry Bucsis and Barbara Somerville

© Karen Yang

Training Your Pet Rat
by Gerry Bucsis and Barbara Somerville
Softcover, 95 pages
2000
Barron's Educational Series, Inc.
250 Wireless Boulevard
Hauppauge, NY 11788
http://www.barronseduc.com
ISBN# 0-7641-1208-2

For those of you interested in doing more with your rats than just watching them sleep and eat and having them run around and chew things up every once in a while, this is the perfect book for you. Gerry Bucsis and Barbara Somerville have written a great introduction to rats, including some very useful information on how to train your rats and keep them alert and active. The whole emphasis of the book is on training and playing with rats and has sections with great titles like, "The perfect house for home-schooling" and "Class size - one rat, two rats, three rats four?"

The book begins with a very nice section on selecting the right housing, bedding and food for your rat. The authors are very thorough with details on how to choose healthy bedding and how to make a very comfortable and interesting home for your rats. Following that comes a great section on choosing a rat and trust-training as well as keeping rats from chewing up your whole house! I love how they cover all the aspects of things like finding great cage accessories and toys - from fancy, store-bought ferret items to do-it-yourself projects that don't cost a penny.

Much of the rest of the book is dedicated to training your rat - from something as relatively simple as walking on a leash, to things that would make any movie director sit up and roll over! They have excellent suggestions on how to set up a play and training area that is safe and fun. With some "squeak and treat" training, your rat will learn how to come, to sit up, to ride happily on your shoulders and even learn to distinguish shapes for an impressive-sounding trick. I haven't given their method a thorough testing yet, but I plan to soon! It sounds like it will work perfectly if you stick to the rules and if your rat is a happy, relaxed learner. They even have a nice section on mazes and games that rats like. If you want to go farther with training your rat, this book lays the foundations for a whole lot of other things you could think up and try out using "squeak-treat"!

Other nice sections of this book are the chapter on traveling with rats, and a section with tips and hints for rat care. The only problems I have with their information is that they recommend a two-week quarantine for new rats, which I feel is a bit too short. Also they seem to recommend bathing your rat once a month - something my rats would think was horrible torture for animals that normally keep themselves so clean. But a once-a-month bath won't hurt much, unless the rat gets overly chilled, and it sure will get your rat used to being handled and splashing about in water very fast!