Always great to have some more rodent fans, even after the sucky parts come up. No matter what kind of fuzzy, feathery, or scaly you have, they always leave too soon. I'm just happy that rats are pretty easy to breed and maintain. If you want, you can have a little piece around forever. I kept the line from my first rat going the full 7 years. None of them were her, but... such is life. If everything stayed around forever, we'd never appreciate any of it.
But on the subject of life, I wanted to highlight a birth recently of a rather obscure and little known rat cousin. The mouse deer!
(you need an account to see links)
This little bebe was born recently at the Bristol Zoo in England, and has been too shy so far for the keepers to figure out its gender. Mouse deer at full height are about as tall as a pencil (8 inches/20 cms). They keep to themselves, and are native to South Asia (with a single related species clustered in Africa). They don't do the horn/antler thing that most other deer do, but they secretly have vampire teeth! Their fancy name, Chevrotain, is based on the old French word for goat.
Now, some of you might be unconvinced of the rodent-y nature of the tiny, tiny mouse deer, but just look at the name. I mean, deer have horns and no vampire teeth, so obviously these deer are not deer at all. Think of deer mice, another misleadingly labeled species.
In conclusion, I hope everyone had fun meeting the (very distant) rodent cousin and has a good day.
Originally Posted by zypiris
