tailess rats?

No - they're talking absolute crap.

xx

http://www.afrma.org/breedtaillessrat.htm

Humans are weeeeeird

Guh! Just read this thread, and I can def relate to wanting to take them home when they're stuck in this little glass tanks! That's how I ended up with Gideon.

Little more on topic, I never heart of Tailless rats before. Though I can see why they'd be popular. For some reason the thing that puts people off them is their tails. (I have no idea why, I LOVE their tails!) I can see people who want something a bit more intelligent than a hamster, but put off my rat tails going for them.

Which is sad, because it probs would be uneducated people who don't really understand the care needs. (Not that I'm an expert) but there's a difference between not knowing and not caring. People may have their hearts in the right place, but not realise what they're taking on.

I feel the same about petshop rats.. On one hand I know they're probably more prone to being unwell, you don't really know where they're coming from, they're harder to tame cos they've not been handled as much as rats from a good breeder.. but then I think what will happen to them if nobody buys them. But then there's also supply and demand, if you buy them they're just gonna get more.

Hard to know what the lesser of the two evils is.

Sorry for necroing this thread a little. But..

Zoundz wrote:As far as I was aware, they are just about impossible to breed true anyway... so I don't know about these. There's a part of me is guessing these might actually have had their tails docked instead of being bred this way. Having said that, I guess it's possible that labs have managed to breed them true - but if they have, I'd not heard about it.

A Dutch rescue had a litter in which several tailless rats were born and they lacked a tail completely, only one had a tiny 'wire' stub which disappeared later if I recall correctly. So yes, they can be bred 'true', though this was a complete coincidence as both the mother as the possible father had a normal tail and it was an accidental litter (not at the rescue of course, they were brought there when the owner found out the doe was not male ).

That said, I believe tailless rats should never be bred as the risks of deformations are too high in my personal opinion. Luckily most Dutch ratteries think the same, even the less reputable ones.

What I meant was that when people have actively tried to breed them to make more it doesn't seem to happen - I'm only going on what I've read/heard mind, as obviously, it's not something I've done/seen firsthand.

xx