Pets can succumb to parasites, the most well known examples of pet parasites are fleas and ticks. Rats are also susceptible to mites and lice. Mites are common on rats and often, the owner does not even know their rats have mites unless they fall ill as healthy rats groom themselves/each other enough to manage the infestation to where there are little to no visual indications of mites.
Some signs of an infestation include excessive itching, and scabs around the neck, ears, face that aren’t deep wounds. If they seem itchier than normal and you have not changed their diet to a higher protein recently there’s a good chance they have mites. The difference between mites and lice are that lice can be seen with the naked eye as their eggs are white and you will see tiny bugs moving around. Mites can only be confirmed through a microscope, but a heavily infested rat may have visible white dust on their hair follicles. I recommend having a veterinarian confirm or deny the presence of mites before trying any treatments at home, they can also prescribe you with medicine as some are hard to acquire in certain countries . Itching wounds are often mistaken as fighting wounds, but monitoring your rats for itching will be your best bet to rule that possibility out. Another false positive indication of mites is if you are feeding a bad source of food to your rats that is lacking nutrition or too high in protein. A bad diet can case dry skin which is itchy to rats. If you’re in the US get a high qualify rat lab block such as Oxbow or Mazuri with the correct protein for their stage of life as rats will pick out what they like in a mix, resulting in a lack of necessary nutrients in their diet.
Mites can come from grains and bedding, which is why it’s important to get high quality rat food and avoid paper bedding (you shouldn’t use paper bedding for a lot of reasons). I also choose to get my kiln-dried aspen bedding from a feed store such as Tractor Supply Co as opposed to Walmart as I trust a feed store to handle their products in a way that prevents wild rats infested with parasites from contaminating their product. I’ve seen a lot of reviews on the brand Kalmbach ordered off Chewy being infested with grain mites. If you ever are concerned about your bedding or food harboring mites, freeze it for a minimum of 24 hours before introducing it to your rats.
Treatment:
I’ll preface this with saying I’m not a vet and consult a vet FIRST if you are concerned but this is what works for me just don’t come for me if it goes wrong! The best cure AND preventative is Cat/Kitten Revolution (flea, tick and mite), not Revolution Plus. You need a prescription, I have a cat so my vet was willing to issue me one for my cat and rats. You can also ship it from outside the country, I used CanadaVet to get Revolution without a prescription, it may take a few weeks to delivery. The dosage is 1 single drop onto their skin through parted fur on their shoulder blade (where they can’t personally lick off) once a month. 1 drop is very hard to see so I verify it has transferred by smelling for the scent of alcohol. If there’s still mites at 2 weeks then it’s a severe infection and you can do a second dose but typically just one drop is enough, be careful not to overdose as 1 drop is the dose for rats up to 2 pounds. Do not give this to baby rats who are not weaned, giving the mom a dose will distribute the medicine through the milk to the kits. Keep them separated until it dries because they will try to lick it off each other. A couple minutes is all you need. After that, it is mostly dry and it is okay if they groom some off each other as most of it has been absorbed into their skin at that point.
If you can’t get the Revolution, then Ivermectin is available on Amazon and at Tractor Supply Co. The dose is the size of a grain on rice and can be given on a peice of bread to each rat once a week for 3 weeks. So 1 grain of rice size once a week for 3 weeks= 3 doses. Make sure they don’t eat each other’s medicine. I’ve had really picky rats that won’t eat it this way and you can mix in the Ivermectin dose with baby food. If they still won’t eat it you can add this mixture to bread.
My vet told me that mites cannot survive without a host so they do not live in the environment for long and can’t live on a human. The mites that rats have are the same mites dogs and cats are susceptible to so to eliminate an infection in your home, every animal in your house needs to receive treatment at the same intervals. You do not need to treat your whole home or deep clean as long as every animal has been treated, they will die off. If you are concerned about the cleanliness of the environment, you can use diluted bleach water, freeze wooden items, wash fleece in hot water, and freeze any bedding/food/treats. Vacuuming can also help if you throw away the contents immediately.
Diatomaceous earth is harmful to rats because they have sensitive respiratory systems so I don’t recommend to use it.
At Moomoo Rattery, all rats and other pets of the home are treated for fleas, ticks, and mites every 1.5-2 months. Our nursing moms get treated when babies are around 3 weeks old so that they are covered in terms of prevention for 1-2 weeks after going to homes.
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