December 30, 2008: I am embarrassed to see that I haven't updated the diary in one and a half years! But to all my loyal rat friends out there, and also to those of you who gave up hoping for more news from me - I am back! :D I actually never left, I have been keeping my eyes on you all... ;) But my center of attention has been a luxury litter of my own, I now have a son almost one year old. My last old rats left us in the beginning of December, and I am taking a break as a rat owner for a short while. But that does not mean I will be sitting on my hands! I have some long term plans for Squeakers, but don't expect to see me advertising rat puppies for sale any day soon. July 19, 2007: Summer is here, and we have four exceptionally nice house guests: Nero, Oreo, Soda and Svint. They are Øystein and Anne Kathrine's rats, and we have looked after them a few times before, so we know them well. They are so sweet and funny! I wouldn't mind having them here all the time! Hilde is unfortunately still alone, but she has been visiting Tonje's rats for a while, and seemed to appreciate the company. I have to start thinking about a solution for her as soon as I am finished in the field for the summer. Among other news, Lotte's autopsy showed no signs of illness, so I don't know how she died. And the new cage is still not finished... June 6, 2007: Lotte passed away during the night. I am suspecting heart failure, since she has been reasonably healthy, her only problem was a beginning cataract on one eye. An autopsy will be performed. February 17, 2007: Long time no update! Sorry about that, you Squeakers-fans/Rat Corner-readers out there! Since the last time I have had to say goodbye to two old favorites, Kerrie and Snipp. Snipp suddenly became very ill and could not breathe properly, and she lost weight rapidly. I started her on medication, but it was probably a severe lung infection that got her. She was 29 months old. Kerrie's hind legs started to weaken as he approached 2 1/2, but apart from that, other signs of old age were absent for a long time, until he finally lost a lot of weight and had trouble moving around without getting stuck here and there. We said goodbye to him right before Christmas, and will remember him as the fantastic rat he was. The sadness of saying goodbye to two such outstanding rats was eased a bit by two of Kerrie's sons, who moved in in November :) Chip and Vla from Rodentopia are two sweethearts that go very well together with Ajax. Update: Just after I had written this entry I got a sad message from Christine, who has been borrowing Popkorn to keep her old rat company. Popkorn was attacked by her ferret while the rats were out playing, and died almost immediately from the wounds. :( :( September 16, 2006: Mopp had to leave us early this month, 28 months old. His hind legs was getting very weak, so we decided it was time. He has been so strong and healthy, so we wanted him to go with dignity. Kerrie has been mated to a female at Rodentopias, hopefully this will produce more Kerrie-like rats! All the rats from Mopp and Lottes litter has moved to new home, except Ajax wich I am keeping. It is good to know I still have some Mopp with me! Some new photos in the galleries of Popkorn, Ajax and Mopp. June 20, 2006: Lotte has given birth to a beautiful litter. I have been so nervous since the birth, not daring to disturb at all, so I'm still not sure how many pups and what sex they are. But today I sneaked a camera in while Lotte went out on a short visit to Snipp, and quickly counted without touching them - it seems to be ~11 of them :) All darkeyed, and I even thought I saw a hooded darling :) Lotte is so relaxed (unlike me), she is being the perfect mother. June 16, 2006: Hilde Haleløs has moved home to us, she is such a sweetie, running around without her tail, and I think she's got a tail-fetish, chasing the other rats' tails! Together with her came a male Wistar lab rat, about her own age, so she would have someone to play with (he was supposed to be a she, but that's another story). He will be moving to Camilla later on, as I already got a Wistar male for breeding. His name is Popkorn, and he is now an apprentice with Mopp and Kerrie. He has already had his first performance with "Rottas reise", in which Kerrie and Mopp has had great success. May 19, 2006: So much has been going on here in our ratty-world, it is very hard to do this update. It started with Lotte giving birth on May 6th, I was so happy to see 12 beautiful new Squeakers enter the world. Unfortunately, she chose to give birth in a small plastic basket at the top of the cage, and the pups got stuck in the basket. I moved the litter down to the bottom of the cage, and - oh, the horrible feeling that crept upon me when I saw Lotte abandon the pups and just going to sleep in the hammock. She was not interested in them at all, it was as if they were not her pups. More details on this awful day and the days that followed can be found on the Squeakers-pages (in Norwegian only). Just four days later it was time to say goodbye to Mesh. It was his time, and it was the right thing to do, but I cried for hours, over him, and the unknown faith of the last little Moppster being taken care of by a lab rat female. Today it was Cripsy's time to leave, she went on the long journey home all by herself - she had been eating less over the last couple of days, and never woke up this morning. Soon we will also have to say goodbye to Aapje, as he has got another lump on his side - opposite to the one he had removed. It is growing just as fast, so he will probably just barely live to his 2nd birthday. He is still the same happy rat mentally, so we will take it one day at the time. Still, some brighter news has come my way, which means that I am able to update my diary at all. The last surviving Moppster is doing fine. She is an agouti female, and her eyes opened today! Right on schedule, that's not bad for someone given the rough start that she had! Her tail had to be amputated, as it had withered away, maybe because of the lack of nutrition, or maybe because the lab rats had given her a hard time at first. She's a real fighter, and she will hopefully be coming home to me soon. However, she's not the only one! I've been thinking about getting another go at the Wistar lines - and now I have the chance. A male Wistar, about 3 months old, is waiting to become a Squeaker :) April 23, 2006: Mesh has got his own site. Planned litter with Lotte and Mopp has been moved to current litters - I hope the mating has been successful, babies are expected around the 8th of May. April 2, 2006: 18 months reports on my first litter has finally been put on the site. Plans are starting to form regarding Squeakers' 3rd litter, starring Mopp and Lotte. Mopp's brother Mesh is currently visiting us since Leo had to ride with Quoth the Raven. Unfortunately, the first confirmed outbreaks of SDA-virus have found Norway, probably through imports from Sweden by pet shops, so I have my hands full taking blood samples and informing vets, rat owners and pet shops around the country. February 14, 2006: Some new photos in the galleries, and Lotte's web page is up and running. Aapje has recovered nicely from his surgery. January 10, 2006: Aapje is a Frankenstein monster! The poor thing had a large lump on his left side, it grew so fast that I almost couldn't get an appointment at the vet for him before it had outgrown him, but now it has been removed. It turned out to be a cancerous growth, but hopefully with no spreading, so he should recover and be back to normal before long. He has been stitched up with thin metal wire, so he truly looks like something out of Dr. Frankenstein's lab! :D I have had a long talk with "Mattilsynet", the Norwegian Food Safety Authorities, which handles all the imports of live animals to Norway, and we have gone through the regulations so I could write a "how to"-list for NTF. It turned out that import from Sweden has been under the same regulations as from other EU countries since 2004, but not even the officials were aware of this change. Earlier it has been allowed to import 10 rats with no requirements or official permissions. This has changed, and we have to follow the new rules. The breeder of Lotte was quite despaired when she heard this, as she had sold her rats to Norway with no claims of permissions. She called Mattilsynet and was told that since she had called and asked about the rules before sending the rats, and had then been told that there were no rules, she did not have to worry. Phew, our rats are safely and legally here! Still, I'll go and get a health certificate for Lotte, just to be safe. December 16, 2005: It was a very hard time for us when Ida had to leave us. I waited as long as I could, but at the end she started losing her good ways, just wanting to sleep. Her appetite never diminished, though! It has now been a while, and I'm ready to start thinking forward again. Cripsy (Sacharissa Cripslock) from my first litter moved back in with us, so Snipp didn't have to be alone for long, which was good. Snipp does not like to be alone, so she became even more "clingy" to me. Also Snipps brother has had his litter in Sweden, and there is a tiny star flicka waiting for me there, hopefully she'll be here soon, to bring the Squeakers clan a step forward :) November 8, 2005: I had to put Lee to sleep yesterday. A very fragile old lady left us with a big sigh. She has been in such good health all her life, so when she suddenly had trouble breathing and stopped eating the decision was easy to make. Ida is still going strong, although I do not know for how long. A week ago NTF arranged our first rat show (and Norway's first as well), which was a huge success. Ida won 1st price for her "roll over"-trick, and Mopp won 1st price for rex-fur. Most appreciated was the rat race, we had so much fun! And NTF's new health foundation got some money. August 3, 2005: Medical updates: Ida had a lump removed from right behind her front leg, and was struggling for some time to recover. Unfortunately another lump has already appeared on her other side, we keep our fingers crossed that this one won't grow so fast. Aapje has been put on medication several times over the past months, to try to help his respiratory problems. We are currently trying out Amoxicillin, which seems to be working. April 2, 2005: Since last entry our rat pack has increased by 7 little squeakers! Snipp was mated to Kristins Ottar, and the result was 4 males and 3 females at the 19th of March. All pups are reserved, and we will not be keeping any of them ourselves, unfortunately. Hopefully I will be able to borrow them for future breeding. The rest of the gang is performing as usual - Kerrie has taken over as alpha rat in the boys' cage, without much resistance from Mopp. There was a period with some squabbling, but no serious fights. It has been a long but peaceful process, and Kerrie has gradually outgrown Mopp both in size and maturity. Aapje is still the smallest and the most childish of them. Ida has a serious eating disorder, and we are struggling to keep her weight down and preventing her from stealing the other females' food. We have at present a visitor, Mopps sister Blenda is living here until the pups are old enough to leave home, then she will take one of them with her home to her new owner. I will put some pictures of her in the visitors' gallery. February 19, 2005: Some changes going on on my pages, so if things aren't working, please be patient (or drop me an e-mail). Some new photos in the Visitors' Gallery. December 16, 2004: Wistar has been (temporarily) replaced to a friend of mine, who has no other rats. She wanted to try to socialise her, after hearing all about my struggles with her over the past months. I've told her to not have too high hopes for Wistar, it does not look very good. On the brighter side of things, I got Snipp as a back-up when the guy who arranged Wistar for me learned that I could not use her for breeding after all. I think he felt quite bad for giving me an aggressive rat, so he contacted a breeder he knew. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that we this time will succeed at Squeakers! December 07, 2004: Angel and Wolf have returned home. New photos in the residents' galleries. November 29, 2004: Plans are not going too well here at Squeakers. Our little lab rat has developed aggression (or at least extreme nervousness), and I am not quite sure what triggered it. For once it is not Ida's fault! ;) She bites me, and she bites her cage mates. She is actually quite wild, and I don't know what to do to calm her. At the moment she is in a smaller cage by herself, she seems to be a bit calmer, but of course when there's noone there to bully... :-/ This means there will be no lab rat offspring at our rattery. I am not even sure I want to try with another lab rat. We'll see. Domino had to be put to sleep a few days after I made the last entry, because he was starting to breathe rather heavily and had lost a lot of weight. His autopsy showed severe damage to the lungs. On the brighter side of things, I learned today that one of my sweeties from my first litter will be bred. I look forward to seeing the results, and to follow the second generation! Koala lives on! :) And, even though I can't manage the temper of my own rats (ref Wistar), I've been given the task to assess the behavior of Angel, from Melody's litter #5. He and his cage mate Wolf are currently living at my office, and they are both great rats! October 2, 2004: Some new photos of them all. September 17, 2004: The introduction of Kerrie and Aapje was painless, and they are now happily stirring up the cage with Mopp and Domino. Well, Domino isn't stirring too much, he is still sniffling from time to time, sometimes quite badly. Antibiotics are not helping significantly, so I'm not bothering him too much with medications. As long as he is happy and active, and doesn't lose too much weight, we'll see how it goes and hope he's not in any pain. I've exeeded my rat limit, I was so lucky to have a lab rat from a laboratory carrying Wistar lines (outbred), so Bjørn just has to live with it ;) She is very sweet and gentle, although it took me a few days to gain her trust. Hopefully she will bring some good genes to our small gene pool. August 21, 2004: Two new rats have entered our lives. After planning for what seems like an eternity, I was finally able to bring home two sweeties from Mariska and Joyce in Holland. They are currently quarantined at my office, but it won't be long now until I can take them home to meet Mopp and Domino. Unfortunately, we lost Koala a month ago due to paralysis. Autopsy showed that it was age related brain damages that caused the paralysis, and I feel confident that this should not pose a problem for further breeding in his lines. Even so, if you have a rat related to him, keep an eye out for early signs of paralysis. Updates on the web pages: Some more photos of Koala, lots of nice ones of Mopp, and a few of my new boys (currently they are called Kerrie and Aapje). May 27, 2004: A new round of lice-treatment at home *sigh*! Fortunately we were infected after Lee left for the office (to be company for Suk), and I haven't found any signs of infection on the babies. Still, now we will keep our doors closed until we are certain the problem's gone! I recommend all to check their rats now and then for signs, it seems to have spread quite bad lately. May 04, 2004: I'm a rat grandmother! Sukhothai gave birth some time during the night or early morning, May 1st. Follow the development of the pups here. April 25, 2004: Updates in galleries: Domino, Ida, Lee and Visitors (Suk was added). Some changes to the Squeakers-pages. Now I'm certain she's pregnant! Big belly and a weight gain of 35 grams... April 12, 2004: The breeding plans are finally forming. Sukhothai was mated to Koala yesterday, hopefully this will be the beginning of something good here at Squeakers. In NTF we have started to approve breeders that follow our guidelines, so in time we will have a small group of serious breeders here in Norway, and maybe we can influence our neighboring countries as well. The Squeakers-pages have been updated, and can now also be found in Norwegian. Actually, most of the details regarding the litters will be found in the Norwegian section only, as I have no plans of shipping my rats to other countries. March 25, 2004:This is one of the saddest entries I've made, and I guess that is why it took me so long to do it. I had to put Fenris to sleep on March 5th, because I could see he was really struggling. He had been getting Baytril for about two and a half weeks without much improvement, but still looking quite happy. But for his last two days he didn't move out of the hammock, and he was breathing very hard and short. I went to Veterinærhøyskolen with him one last time, knowing he was not coming back home. A favourite is gone, and we miss him very much. He always had a very calm and mellow way about him, and Bjørn always thought he was the most intelligent of the rats, because he would sit quietly on the armrest of the sofa, seeming to ponder about those important questions in life. Rest forever in peace, little Dempis, your lungs are working again now. :( February 27, 2004: Our husky-boy Fenris is 2 years old today! And although he's on Baytril for snuffles, he's still going (semi)strong! I hope to have him here another 2 years. February 20, 2004: Bjørn finally found a name for our new girl: Lee, after Jamie Lee Curtis. I think it is due to her skinny appearance... She is not fully grown, she is long and thin, and in addition, we compare her to Ida, which is a fat little cow :D Fenris is ill again, and has been on Baytril now for a while, as it really got bad this time. He was also infested with lice - and I mean REALLY infested, which didn't make things any better. But a drop of ivermectin solved that problem, and he will hopefully feel better in a few days. He also gets a lot of nutrient-rich, fat and yummy food, as he has lost almost 50 grams. Of course it is impossible to keep all the good food from Koala :} Domino is once again back in the girls' cage, his activity level is a bit too high for the sick little one. But he seems to have made best friends with Lee, which still gets hassled by Ida. Nothing serious, though, Ida just doesn't want any competition for the food. February 08, 2004: For the first time since Domino's castration, he is sleeping peacefully in the hammock together with Fenris and Koala! :) February 06, 2004: Our latest promising star has moved in. She hasn't got a name yet, but on her pedigree she's known as Suncritters Dabih. I've put some photos on her page already, and updated the "planned litters"-pages of Squeakers (look under "other"). Let's keep our fingers crossed this time! Domino finally has stopped bullying Fenris, so it may seem that he's finally settling down after the castration. However, he did NOT like a new girl on his turf, as the photos in Dabih's gallery clearly show! Ida has accepted her, fortunately, so we'll just give it some time. December 12, 2003: Ida has grown huuuge, she now has the formidable weight of 360g. And I don't think it is ALL fat... :) Domino is still a bit bossy towards Fenris at times, so he now lives more or less permanently with Ida. Which is good, because we still haven't started on the new cage, and until we do I'm not allowed to bring her friend home! Tough living! Christmas is soon coming, Bjørn will take Ida and Domino home to his parents, and I will bring the oldies with me to Trondheim. Looking forward to seeing some family! November 1, 2003: All my plans for Ida and my rattery went down the drain today, as I learned that Ida's father, Phantom, has been put to sleep due to aggression. His re-introduction to the male group was not successful at all, and attacked and injured his cagemates and his humans as well. *sigh* Back to square one... :( October 16, 2003: Some updates on the faq. Domino has been introduced to Ida, without problems. She seems very happy to have a rat friend! October 11, 2003: Ida's web page is ready, and photos are online! October 09, 2003: Lots of news since last entry! First of all, I got my new girl home from Denmark. She is sooo cute! And I have lots of hopes for her in the future. Photos and more info will soon be available. And in the line of happenings, I got my rattery pages up and running, have a look under "others", I have preliminarily called it Squeaker Rats (or Squeaker's Rattery). We'll see what I end up with. On the darker side of events, I had to have Domino castrated (Sept 19th). He started becoming more and more aggressive towards Fenris, and when I was at home for a weekend he bit me. Intentionally. So we performed an "emergency castration" at Groruddalen Dyreklinikk, and he seems to have calmed down. I was sooo disappointed, because he has always been so good with people! But at least I didn't fall for the temptation to breed him. Fenris and Koala are doing fine, although they are a bit confused as to where Domino's position in the hierarchy is now - they still look like they expect him to turn on them any minute! July 07, 2003: Some bad news today... One of my all time favourite rats, Albert ("Juledyret Albert") died today. He will be deeply missed, our sweetest little purse! Suntiger, I'm so sorry for your loss. July 06, 2003: Some major updates in the galleries, and brand new video files has been put on the "other" side. :) I've been trying to find a compromise regarding the video files, I like to keep them as small as possible without loosing too much information, so I decided to go with the DivX codec. This means you'll have to download DivX to see the videos, but I've made it easy and put a link on the "videos" page. It's well worth trying, I'm quite proud of some of the clips! June 15, 2003: Finally Domino has made it to the top of the ladder, and there is more peace and quiet in the cage again. Fenris had a bit of a problem letting go of the alpha position, yet did not manage to stand up to Domino's repeated attempts to pick a fight. When Fenris finally had to give Domino 4 paws up, he was a bit depressed and nervous for a couple of days, but now there seems to be no problems among them. Domino is no longer pushing Fenris' limits, and Fenris seems content too. In the middle of all this, Koala has made sure to keep his bottom position in his own calm, lazy way..."Is this fight about food? No? Then what's the hassle?" :) Among other news, I can mention I've been elected leader of NTF, and I'm really looking forward to working with that the next year. And Suntiger is coming for a visit in August! Yaaaay! March 09, 2003: The new layout for the gallery pages is ready, hopefully I will update them with new photos soon. I have also made a page for "the oldies", with a short presentation of my earlier (pre-web) rats. See them at the "Past"-link. The rats (present) have also been weighed again, they are growing huuuge... Feb 08, 2003: Not much activity on the ratty pages lately! We have been busy moving, and now Bjørn is in Oslo with the rats while I finish up some things in Silkeborg. It is sad to be parted from the rats for so long! But the occasional visit to Suntiger gives me a dose to live on for a while... Nov 23, 2002: A new addition to the clan: Domino! He is a Speedy Gonzales from Copenhagen, and keeps the other two busy with all his fuss and fun. He was bred by Mickey, and I can truly say that Mickey has done a great job raising the little critters! He is full of confidence and has settled in nicely with Fenris and Koala. Nov 07, 2002: Finally the new rat pages are up and running. There may be som glitches in the links here and there, but hopefully it will be possible to see my new critters and what they're up to. The mischief today contains Fenris and Koala, two sweet Copenhagen Stars. A third one is waiting for me at Mickey's rattery! Ye Olde Diary (Rotte & B) Copyright Heidi Sjursen Konestabo, 2002-2007