A roomie cage with levels and lots of toys are essential for your pet rat to live a full and happy life.
Rats are also very social creatures and more than likely you have 2 or more rats to love.
The more rats you have, the larger cage you will require. You can view all of our cages on the
About PWRR page for visual examples and messurements of the size of cage rats need.
If you already have a cage and want to see how many rats can comfotably live in it
you can use one of the cage calculators below.
So far the easiest to use calculator for us has been Calculator #2 above.
However a cage with multiple shelves, toys, & wheels should also be taken in to
consideration, with that in mind calculator # 3 is the MOST accurate.
A good safe spacious cage is essential for your pet rats! For adult rats I highly recommend the Ferret Nation. It makes the use of bedding almost un necessary. We cover our Ferret nation shelves and pans with Fleece and then have corner litter pans with Aspen in them. They are so easy to maintain. Just change the litter box every few days and if you have a hand held vacuum it's perfect to run through the cage a few times a day. So far I have only had to change the fleece in the cages every 4 days.
Another great brand of cage for rats are Martins cages. The bar spacing is much smaller which is great for petite females or young babies. I have not ever personally owned a Martins but many rat lovers out there swear by them. They are supposed to be easy to clean, safe for the rats, and roomy. Keep the cage calculator in mind though!
Wire Bottoms, Shelves & Wheels
Rats have very fragile (and cute) feet & limbs. They can become injured easily in cages containing wire floors or levels. If your rats cage has a wire bottom you need to remove it immediately! There is always a way to remove a wire bottom in a cage even if that means busting out the metal cutters! Nothing is worth the risk of injuring one of your rats adorable feet or limbs. To learn about some injuries caused by wire cage bottoms click HERE. There are many way to cover wire levels with towels, cross stitching boards, or just cardboard. You can easily attach them to the level so they don't move by using zippy ties. If you have a running wheel similar to these:
you should line the inside of them with some cross stitching pattern boards (found at walmart in crafts sections), they can be tied down also, with zippy ties (found at walmart in hardware section) These types of wheels can be extremely dangerous for ANY small animal. Their legs easily fall through the bars and if the wheel is going fast you might be on the way to the animal ER for a broken leg.
We recomend using the metal running wheels with mesh instead of widely spaced bars. Rats can't fit their feet through the holes and they are easier to grip and simple to clean. This is an example of the wheel I am refering to:
Some other safe and great wheels for rats are:
The silent spinner wheel is overall a safe wheel, however I have had them tip over on occasion with some of our more vigorous runners if sitting in the bottom of the cage, they do have clips on the back that can attach to most wire cages though. So far I have not had a chewing problem with these wheels because they are made of hard plastic as opposed to soft plastic which is easy to chew through.
This wheel is also a great choice, they too will tip if sitting at the bottom of a cage but have clips on the back that attach to most wire cages. The only thing I don't like about this wheel is that the rats tend to chew it up very quickly because it is a soft plastic.
A good way to tell the difference between hard and soft plastic is to try and bend it, if it bends easily (much like rubber) then it is soft plastic, hard plastic will break when bent. Don't try this out in pet shops! LOL
