I had hamsters once. Two adorable Siberian dwarf brothers. The girl who gave them to me said that since they had been together since they were babies, the would get along just fine. They did--for a while. Until the night that, while my husband and I slept, one brutally murdered the other. I could never look at the surviving hamster the same way again. I was done with hamsters after that.Enter my first fancy mice. I bought four females and named them after famous female writers. What sweet, gentle creatures they were. They lived in a four-room habitat that my husband built, and I loved watching them work together to set one room up as their sleeping chamber. We would dump in shredded paper and watch them collaborate to move it from room to room. They would sit on your shoulder or in your hand and would never bite or act aggressively. I owned a number of lovely female mice after that, eventually deciding to give rats a try.
A friend of a friend needed to rehome two rats to which she was allergic, and that's how Garin and Hastings entered my life. Hastings was grumpy and irascible, like the Thoroughbred of the same name. Garin, on the other hand, was sweet and friendly. He eventually developed a tumor on his face, which was a sad, terrible experience. After that, I resolved to only buy rats from breeders rather than pet stores, in hopes that these rats would be less susceptible to tumors.
I found a wonderful breeder in my area called Phoenix Gate Rattery and was put on the waiting list. The rat that I ended up getting was a lovely lilac/tan color. His name was Px Walk the Plank (the litter theme was pirates), call name Heiko. Heiko was yet another kind, genial rat. He never showed the slightest aggression to anyone. Even Hastings got along with the amiable fellow.When Hastings passed on, I decided that Heiko needed some new friends, so I went back to Phoenix Gate and got two lucky-themed brothers--a black male named Px Fortunate One (Taavi) and a chocolate named Px Make Your Own Luck (Raimo). Heiko accepted these babies with his usual equanimity. After the brothers were grown, Heiko died unexpectedly. In the meantime, we had taken on a petstore rat from a friend of my sister-in-law. Louie is a lovely silver and white fellow, very affable and winning. So we have a happy family of three rats right now.
Rats and mice are sociable, gregarious creatures. If you are looking for a small mammal as a pet, you can't do better than rats or mice. While they might nibble your fingers if you stick them through the bars of their cage, none of my rats has ever bitten when being picked up or held, something I can't say about hamsters. In contrast, they are exceedingly agreeable. And even my mother, who never anticipated that she would be favorably disposed to these rodents, has to admit that they are cute. Fancy rats and mice want to be your friends. And don't we all need more friends?
