Rat Care Hints and Tips

How to Feed Baytril to Sick Rats

Caring for a sick pet rat can be a big responsibility and sometimes it is made harder by your rat not cooperating in taking its medicine. Here in the UK Baytril is one of the first and most effective antibiotic medicines that vets will give your rats. Baytril comes in liquid form and is often administered orally. Unfortunately you cannot tell your rat to eat up its medicine to make it all better and they will often turn their noses up at it if offered it to lick up. You can try syringing it straight into their mouths, but if your rat is particularly wriggly, or just too poorly to be manhandled then this is not going to work.

Food is always a good option, but as Baytril is a liquid it is best to choose something it can mix in with, like yogurt, soup, some nice sauce or my favorite option, baby food. Baby food is not just great for administering medicine it is also nutritious, this can be an added bonus if your rat is very poorly and loosing weight. It is available in jars, which are ready to eat, but I prefer the powdered variety of baby food that comes in boxes as it lasts longer and you can mix it up to the consistency you want.

Making it watery is a good way to get fluids into your rats; if you are concerned they are not drinking. I go for the oat and porridge flavours, but your rats will no doubt let you know what they like. Give them as small amount as you can mix their medicine in and it should go down a treat.

Often with things like respiratory illness your rat may struggle to eat their normal dried rat food, and baby food is great because they can just take their time and lap it up. Sick rats can loose weight alarmingly quickly, which of course makes it harder for them to recover from any illness they have.

So, baby food is a great way to feed your rat Baytril, while also giving them the nutrition and fluid they need in an easy to consume form.