Pip the Rat by Supersim

Our rat, Pip, will chew on anything!  Computer cords, cardboard boxes, your fingernail, and even your hair!  He's really supposed to chew on the things in his cage, like the little wooden blocks we buy him.   

The other things he likes to do are: eating, licking your finger, and exploring the Magical Office.  When he's in the office, he likes to climb around in the Enchanted Bookshelf.  Then hide inside the Cave of Sofa. And then crawl across the haunted Copy Machine.  Then scamper across the Dazzling Laptop.  Then he'll trot across your Mystic Foot!  

He also enjoys jumping, even in places where he can't grip onto, like he tried to jump into a mirror once.  He also tried to jump onto a lamp and then he fell backwards.

Pip loves to eat sunflower seeds, cashews, apples, rice, cheese, cereal, cookies, crackers and rat treats.  He drinks a lot of water.  That's why he has 3 water bottles.

  

This is what it looks like when Pip runs across the keyboard:

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If you're going to keep a rat as a pet, make sure you give it a lot of attention.  Make sure to give it plenty of water, and change its bedding every week.  Put a little bit of salt in your rat's diet, like a little bit of a cracker every day.  Always have nutritious food in the cage.   Feel free to feed them peanut buttered apples.  You may have heard that rats like chocolate but it's not true.  If you feed a rat chocolate it could die.

Rats are not like hamsters or mice or gerbils.  They're really sweet.  They are kind of like tiny dogs that climb.  I guess you could say they are a tiny dog-monkey.  They love to play.  Just when you least expect it, they crawl on you and put their wet nose on you and lick you.  They love it when you rub behind their ears.  

Make sure not to put the same gender of rats in one cage unless they're from the same litter.  You can't put them in the same cage because they will fight. You don't really have to bathe your rat because they groom themselves.  When their cage gets dirty, make sure to buy them some new bedding, rinse off the cage with warm water, and then remember to dry it off.  Rats can get a cold.  Never use dusty bedding--it can get in their eyes and nose.

Rats are better than ferrets or any other rodent because they don't smell or bite.  Rats are not like how they look in cartoons.  They are sweet and gentle.