Remmy Joined the Village

Remmy joined Vermin Village on April 24th, 2010! Remmy is a cute rattie boy that was adopted from a nice lady on CL. Remmy is a big boy with an even bigger personality.

He spent last night in his own cage, waiting to move in with his new lady friends.

Today he moved in with his new lady friends and they are ALL doing great. Mischa (adopted from LMR), who lost her cage mate, Remi, several weeks ago and Merriweather, another CL rattie girl--former feeder are his two new friends. Merriweather lost her cage mate, Junior, a few weeks ago as well. Both ladies are spayed so no hankie pankie will happen, no matter how persistent Remmy will be. :) They were also introduced for the first time today.

They are doing really well and I think they'll be just fine!

Mimi Passes In the Night

I write this with a very heavy heart. Mimi, our little Siamese licky girl passed away. I walked in the room and she was dead in her cage. Words can not describe how upset this makes me. I told John and he was upset too. "Not my licky girl!"

Mimi was John's baby. She is survived by her cage mate, Junior. She didn't like other females so she needed a macho boy to live with. (She was spayed.)

Lee originally went to pick her up at my request in May 2008 (she was already 8-10 months old). Her family decided they no longer wanted her. Lee tried her living with Clive, but Clive was a push over and Mimi bossed him around. (Clive is neutered.)

I went to get Mimi. I tried to put her with girls and she attacked them all. I had her spayed and then when Junior came, he was introduced as her new buddy. They loved each other very much. Junior looked after his lady.

When Mimi was choking, he pulled a blanket out of the hammock and spread it on the floor for her to lay on. Then he laid right next to her, licking her face while she worked it out.

Mimi has been prepared for private cremation on the Oregon Humane Society.

Run free little Mimi. You can have as many treats as you want!

Ratties Move....New Cage Purchase

Libby has been moved to the downstairs BC-6. She is living next store to Bella. Bella has been moved from the home with the 5 girls. They do ok, but Bella has 4 tumors and Libby needed a friend. Bella was ok with the other group of girls but she was not so bonded that she didn't like the change. She seems to love having a part of a cage to herself and still be able to visit with Libby.

Libby also has a small tumor and she is also pretty old. :( So they are two little old ladies that hang out side-by-side in their hammocks.

Mimi and Junior were moved back downstairs into a BC-6. Junior still gets a bit nervous around a lot of noise but he so enjoys hamming it up when he knows you're looking at him. These are the 2 I hope to put the 2 spayed girls with. Mimi is also spayed of course.

Sherman and Luke are in the lower BC-6. They have lots of fun. I've thrown in lots of newspaper in all of the cages and they've gone to town with making nests. It cracks me up to see the 2 boys in their hammocks with newspaper all around them. They have blankets too but it must be something about the paper. lol

Upstairs, the BC-7s are waiting to be cleaned. Remi is currently hanging out downstairs while this is happening. Remi will be moving into a split BC-7 with Cricket on the other side. Hopefully they will get used to each other so the divider can come out. Potter and Joey are also in a carrier waiting for the BC-7 (they used to live in a BC-6). I've downsized the room to 2 stacks of BC-7 and moved all of the BC-6 downstairs. Of course the 4 custom multi-leveled cages are still up there.

Trixie, Pixie and Boo have moved into Tickle Tower! (Remember Boo is neutered.) So far so good. Since Libby has moved downstairs, she was living in the upper level of the Tower, there was more room to move the 3 in. Boo doesn't know quite what to do. The tower has lots of stuff for them to play in and hammocks to sack out in. Sadly, the matriarch, Shäst, has really slowed down. I'm hesitent to move her though. I put everthing she needs on the level she stays on. Although water is available on all levels. She spends most of the time in the hammock. I don't want to move her out because her friends Lucy and Nona are good company for her and take care of their old friend.


I did purchase a used Quality Cage, BC-11 1/2 cage from a private party. I went to Quality Cages and purchased a stand, as shown in the picture. I also had extra doors made for easier cleaning. I also need to purchase 2 more doors to cover the nest box holes, but that is not a problem! Turns out they made a new product for the chinchilla cages. It is a powder coated metal shelf. So I got 3 of those to try out in this cage. I'll see how they work and might order more, maybe even wider shelves. It's so exciting. The cage is very big, but if I keep it downstairs, which is where it will eventually end up, I can just roll it out the front door to clean. Currently, this cage is in storage.

Anyway, it has been very busy at the village.

Mimi Chokes

At about 9am, I gave my little girl Mimi a piece of homemade tortilla chip. She started to drool and fold her ears back and her mouth opened really wide. I have no car, but my husband works close. Finally at about 9:30, she cleared it. She is now grooming me. Her way of saying sorry for scaring the hell out of me. My husband was ready to fly home and take her to the vet. No more tortillas for her!

One of the touching parts of the event was that Junior dragged a blanket over to Mimi and spread it out so she could lay on it. Then he'd check her mouth and run to the cage door. He gets the hero award today!

Mimi and Junior

I've decided that Mimi and Junior should do very well together. Mimi was acquired through my friend LR. She picked her up with the hopes she'd do well with her neutered boy. Mimi didn't. I took Mimi. Oh, she is such a kissy girl!

Anyway, I've been unable to find someone to bond with Mimi. She does not like other girls. I did have her spayed because I wanted to double her chances of finding a friend for her.

Enter Junior. Junior was saved by CR. He needed some extra special work so he came here. He is doing WONDERFUL.

Anyway, their cages have been side by side for the past several weeks. And they've been playing outside their cages together. I will be changing their cages to one cage with a divider and hopefully, within a few weeks, they will be residing together in rattie happiness.

Junior

A new little boy has come to Vermin Village. He's a black and white hooded rattie. He is very shy, but I am going to be working with him on this. I'll set up a neuter appointment for him as well. He doesn't bite but I'm hoping it will calm him down. He'll be living in our bathroom in his own cage for a while. He has a very sweet face. Hopefully it will all go well. After he gets neutered, I'll move him to the downstairs cage.

He was adopted from a wonderful family that has several rats but also a small child and it was hard to work with him in a "calm" manner. This family took him in from a HORRIBLE situation so I'm so grateful they gave him a chance. His previous owner dumped him and 2 hamsters in their apartment after vacating it. The 3 rodents were left running around loose. Dumb ass people. The people that run the apartments were trying to rehome them and while my friend called about the hammies she found out about the rat. After asking what they intended to do with him--bring him to the Vancouver Humane Society that said they would euthanize him OR the woman's boyfriend would feed him to his alligator.

So he is safe and sound here and I'm sure he'll be just fine.