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Safe Foods

Your Rats diet is possibly the most important aspect of keeping a healthy and active Rat while reducing the risks of health problems due to unbalanced nutrition.

There are a large amount of diseases that can be avoided or at least reduced by feeding your pet a balanced and vitamin efficient diet.

While balance is important in a Rats diet you should avoid giving the same foods continuously as Rats do like a varied diet. You may have a day or 2 that your Rats diet does not meet all nutritional needs but generally that will even out over the next 5 days or so.

This list is made to assist you in choosing foods that are appropriate to feed your Rat a balanced diet without it becoming boring for your pet.

Rats generally do not require more than around 15% of their diet to be protein unless you have a pregnant, lactating or growing rat at which point their diet can consist of around 25% protein to help promote growth. Too much protein can lead to a variety of problems including skin allergies.

Your Rats main diet should consist of Rat cubes (Lab blocks) as these have a variety of nutritional needs in one block. The problem with feeding your Rat only seed mixes is that they can pick and choose which seeds they will eat resulting in an unbalanced diet. The Rat cubes (also called lab blocks) have a variety of seeds and vitamins all contained in the one cube so Rats must eat all of the combined ingredients ensuring a more balanced diet however we do not recommend that the Rat cubes become the only food offered as they are bland and we believe a varied diet is important. Having Rat cubes available at all times along with a dry mix and regular meals of fresh fruit, vegetable and meat will help keep your rats happy and healthy. PRRR has available, for purchase, Lab blocks which are sourced from a supplier that also provide this product to Labs for lab rats. The Lab blocks are a balanced diet, we can provide you with the breakdown of Protein, fat etc. If you would like this information please send us an email. There are other rat cubes (lab blocks) available in a variety of places but it has been our experience that these products are not made specifically for rats and the nutritional information on them in not available.

Protein rich food include:

Please do not feed you Rat high fat foods regularly as this can increase the risk of tumor growths. Some fibres can reduce the Blood Cholesterol Levels which can be of aid to Rats that are suffering from a diet too high in Fats. Some foods that can help lower the BCL are:

Fibre also helps promote intestinal health, bowel regularity, assists weight control and may help prevent colon cancer.

The amount of sodium offered and consumed should be limited as too much salt can increase the risk of high blood pressure, which can also increase the risk of heart disease, stroke and kidney problems in your Rat.

You can offer your Rat a variety of seeds in their diet including:

Although these foods are readily accepted by most Rats we recommend that some like the sunflower seeds only be offered occasionally as these can cause obesity if consumed regularly.

There are a large range of grains and flours that you can offer to your Rat on a regular basis. Some grains and flours that are safe to offer are:

There are also a large range of fruit and vegetables that you can offer your Rats as part of their daily diet.  We encourage all Rat owners to offer their Rats a variety of fresh fruit and vegetables on a regular basis as they are readily accepted and enjoyed by most Rats.

Fruit and Vegetables that can be safely offered are :

If you feed your Rat processed foods it is advisable to limit these foods as they generally contain preservatives, colour enhancers and high salt levels which are not good for your Rats.
The best guide when deciding what foods to offer is by choosing the most natural ones. Low calorie diets are believed to help extend the life of your Rats, high protein diets are generally best used for pregnant, lactating and very young rats to help promote growth however to maintain health it is recommended to only include approximately 15% (or less) protein in your Rats diet.

In addition to the above products, when your rats are feeling unwell they may not eat as much and begin to lose condition and weight. Some products which have been used, with success at encouraging weight gain in these rats are;