Poorly Wheeler

Wheeler isn't well. It's been an on/off fortnight with him and he's getting an x-ray today to see if we can work out the problem.


One of the biggest issues has been getting him to take his antibiotics and painkiller. Yesterday we ended up forcing him to eat it by squirting it into his mouth with the syringe. Needless to say he hated that!

We have tried various options to hide the drugs -

Ribena - concentrated or diluted he wasn't impressed
Maple Syrup - ignored
Hazelnut and Toffee yogurt - loathed (though Tom also tried this one and hated it)
Breakfast Granola - worked with the painkiller
Muller Rice (Strawberry) - worked with antibiotic (NB: other flavours are available but he wasn't going for it at all)
Baby Food (fruit based) - sometimes worked

Things we discovered were that leaving treats in cage means Mortimer eats them (or stashes them), a dish of yogurt or similar results in grumpy rat sitting in it rather than eating it and sometimes savory works better than sweet (Naturals Vegetable Edges seem to have gone down better than other options).

Last night he wasn't eating much or drinking much and was generally looking sorry for himself so we don't know if he'll make it through the gas for the x-ray.

***Results from the x-ray were not good. He has bone cancer in his left rear leg and although we don't know if it has spread it might have.