# Barbering in rats



## simplysardonic (Sep 1, 2009)

Does anyone have any experience with this & how to stop it, Hyldi's being barbered & it's something I've never dealt with before!


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## blade100 (Aug 24, 2009)

I've had this in the past.
Is it another that's doing it to her? If so it's either dominace or just over grooming.
Or is she doing it herself?


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## blade100 (Aug 24, 2009)

Some info that i found on fancy rats info
Barber - Excessive grooming in which the fur is nibbled off. Rats may barber each other or themselves, in which case frequent areas of barbering and subsequent bald spots on other rats are the head, face, neck and shoulders. There may be an underlying health reason for barbering.

And this


Hair loss and bald patches can be caused by barbering, where another rat is over grooming to an extent of grooming the hair off. The barberer will quite often barber all the hair off their own front legs as well as patches on other rats. It is not known exactly what causes this, but boredom and stress may be a cause. If the bald patches appear to have a red circle effect to them, it is possible it could be ringworm (treatable with Ivermectin). This needs treating swiftly as it is possible to transmit this to humans.


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## simplysardonic (Sep 1, 2009)

blade100 said:


> I've had this in the past.
> Is it another that's doing it to her? If so it's either dominace or just over grooming.
> Or is she doing it herself?


Its either Tau or Pippin as it's behind her ears where she can't reach, I haven't actually caught anyone doing it & it's literally only come on in the last couple of weeks (though it was mites at first). I think, knowing the girls, it's more likely to be Tau as she's the more assertive of the 2


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## blade100 (Aug 24, 2009)

Looks like it's just excessive grooming I don't think there's much you can do about it. At least she's nice and clean behind the ears lol


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## LostGirl (Jan 16, 2009)

My two oldest rescue barber I havnt manage to stop it  they vet said its habit as they spent well over 12 months doing it to themselves 

I've tried changing the cage regularly to keep them from being bored, free play etc do I don't know 

I do de-mite mine every few months just in case but it's only these two older girls that do it


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## simplysardonic (Sep 1, 2009)

blade100 said:


> Some info that i found on fancy rats info
> Barber - Excessive grooming in which the fur is nibbled off. Rats may barber each other or themselves, in which case frequent areas of barbering and subsequent bald spots on other rats are the head, face, neck and shoulders. There may be an underlying health reason for barbering.
> 
> And this
> ...


Thankyou for this
She's just been to the vet & had a skin scrape & it came back negative for mites (no scabs), I've seen ringworm before (in cats) & it doesn't look like what I've seen & there's no red circles.


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## simplysardonic (Sep 1, 2009)

LostGirl said:


> My two oldest rescue barber I havnt manage to stop it  they vet said its habit as they spent well over 12 months doing it to themselves
> 
> I've tried changing the cage regularly to keep them from being bored, free play etc do I don't know
> 
> I do de-mite mine every few months just in case but it's only these two older girls that do it


Tau & Pippin are rescues too, they came from a really nasty environment but I would have expected this sort of behaviour from the beginning. I'm wracking my brain trying to think if there's been anything stressful that might have affected them but I can't think of anything specific, they lost a cagemate a few months ago but this has happened recently


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