Deffinitely change your source, that is good advise. Find out where the petstores get their stock as well, as several petstores may get their stock from the same supplier, and if all they are getting are short lived, unhealthy disease carrying etc, rats, it won't matter if you get them from another petstore. Some petstores breed their own but this may not be any better, as I doubt they worry about adding fresh blood, just breed the male/female till death and start breeding offspring to replace them, till the babies are so inbred they are much more prone to common rat ailments, such as tumors, myro etc.



I also suggest you move your pet rat elsewhere. It is always possible she/he is a carrier for something that is making your new rats sick. Though I can't think of any specific disease rats can carry and infect other rats and not be infected themselves, it is always possible. It could easily be transmitted by any external parasites your rat may have.



Deffinitely clean and disinfect everything used with the rats that kept dying. Disinfect the area around where you usually keep them. Also make sure there isn't anything in the area that could be giving off fumes or is toxic to rats. (though if this was the case, would have killed your own rat by now too).



When buying new rats, make sure they are young, and ask for pet rats, instead of feeder/breeder rats. The petstore doesn't need to know what you plan to do with your rats. Getting a couple young females from one petstore (that doesn't share stock with those who's rats you bought died on you that is) and a male from a different source, will help ensure fresh bloodlines (in theory anyway). Get them all the same day or in a day or two of eachther, so you can put the whole group together. Even though it's not good to breed rats too young, I find they tend to not produce for a few months of being together anyway so by that time, the females will be old enough to carry their first litter.



Don't ask for live feeder rats, or adult rats as you have no ideal how old they are. Some could very well be retired breeders the petstore has, and thus wont' live long anyway, being bred out and old. You can also sometimes get young rats by checking the local classifieds. There are always people who buy two rats and either the petstore is clueless on how to sex rats or the owners were clueless on recognizing or asking for same sex groups, or realize just how easily and how often rats breed and how big the litters are. IN this case be selective. If the rats dont' look healthy, are unclean, etc, don't buy them. It is even possible to make a deal with them, take all the females for a discount (ie 3 for price of 2 etc) and most likely they will go for it, as they are trying to et rid of extra rats as it is and it's not always easy to find homes for rats or mice. Again, don't say you are going to use them as food for your snakes, or as breeders. People can be really touchy about that. Just say you love rats and had a few die of old age recently and want to get more...or whatever plausable story you can come up with. Maybe not a nice thing to do but if these people really cared about their rats and knew how to take care of them properly, they wouldn't have bred them in the first place LOL. Most are pets bought for kids who became bored with them after a few weeks or insisted on getting a male and female or whatever, and now the parents want to get rid of all the rats cause their kids don't care about them anymore etc.
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PHLdyPayne

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