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Popeye by Charlotte Tropp, Upper Marlboro, MD
Late last August, an unfortunate and scared little rat came into our lives. We were ratless, having lost a dear female dumbo just weeks earlier.
We were not ready to open our hearts yet, but some stories have Happy Endings! My daughter Lisa had attended a barbecue that day, and was sickened
by what she saw. The people in the house had a snake, and had put a brown male rat in the cage for the snake to eat. The rat was too big for the
snake to eat, but it would strike at the rat and bite him. The poor rat was terrified. He had nothing but snake water to drink for the five days
that the rat had been held a prisoner. When Lisa saw this, she rescued the ratty and put him in a box. She called me up, and I said that I would
keep him just until I figured out what to do with him.
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What a scared little boy we saw when we looked into the box! He was terrified, and his left back foot was red and swollen to almost twice its
size. He also had a bite mark on his side. We put him in his cage to let him rest. To be honest, I thought that he would die from his injuries
and the whole ordeal. My husband was also afraid that he would be mean and aggressive, and didn't want us to keep him.
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Well, I called Debbie "The Rat Lady" for advice on what to do with the boy's swollen foot, and she reassured me that the swelling would go down.
I took him to our vet, Dr. Raichura, who specializes in small mammals. She said that he would be alright (the foot already looked much better)
but that he had pin worms. I gave him his medicine by dropper once a day for five days, and the loose smelly stools stopped. I was won over by
the fact that Popeye (oh yes, by now my husband had named him) did not try to bite me or snap at me while I held him and gave him his medicine. By
now, he would start to take a few choice pieces of fruit from my fingers. Every night we would take Popeye out and hold him and scritch him, and
before you would know it, we had a sweet baby boy to love!
Now we love Popeye ever so much, and Popeye says that he loves us, too! He is a brown rex rat, with curly fur and whiskers. Now
you tell me, isn't this a Happy Ending?
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