hello its shadow the rat in today's video I thought I'd talk a bit about how you can pet and cuddle your rats now keep in mind that not every rat will like being pet or cuddled and in this case you really just need to respect their boundaries and not force it upon them now if your bat is under a year old and doesn't like really being pet or cuddled but as friendly otherwise chances are they'll become cuddly as they age so just continue to you know interact with them handle them and such I don't expect them to be very cuddly or pedable while they're still so young now first I thought I'd go over some signs that your rat is very much happy with the way you're petting them I want you to continue these would be things like Brooke sing which is when they grind their teeth back and forth together bugling which is when their eyes pop in and out or when they're just sitting very still in your lap and they look very content you know they might have droopy eyes they might not they'll probably just be sitting there very relaxed and a very happy looking sort of position and then another thing you can look for is if you're petting their cheek for example they might lean into it and when you stop they might look up at you like why'd you stop keep going and then finally something else to look for is if your rat is grooming you back so if you're petting them sometimes the rat will like to lick and nibble you back or if you stop they might look and nibble you to tell you to keep going and all these signs are just really good examples that your rat wants you to continue petting them and it's very much enjoying the experience along with you so now I thought I'd get into some of the places you can try petting your rat now keep in mind of course that not all rats will like being pet in the same place now one of the best places I've found to Pat my rats that like being pet is on their cheek for some reason a lot of rats seem to like it when you give them a cheek rub so I wait until they're kind of sleepy or until they're just very calm and then I just start scratching their cheek like you can see in the video and they'll usually lean into it if they like it or it'll start licking me back which is a good sign that I can continue because they are very much enjoying it now another place that you can try petting them is along their crest or their scruff so this would just be the neck area and I found that rats like it when you ruffle the fur backwards here and I think I'm gonna have a clip on screen right now of latté being ruffled in this way because she very much likes it and whenever I do it she starts closing our eyes and starts bruxing and boggling and just seems very very so another way you can try petting your rat is what I call the full body stroke and this is just when you stroke down their back or you scrunch down their back with one hand and I find that one that's isn't really the favorite method of any of my rats once they're no very cuddly or calm mood they do tend to like this quite a bit yet another thing you can try is scratching around the ears I find that some of my girls are a bit sensitive in this area and they don't really like it but other ones really like it when you scratch around the base of the ear and just give them a little bit of an ear scratch and as you can see in the video I have on right now Lotte does tend to like these ear scratches more than my other rats and finally we have what I would call the belly rub now not very many rats seem to like these or at least not in my experience and this is probably because being on their back is a very vulnerable position now with my girls I don't just up and flip them over when I'm petting them it's more that they're already used to being flipped over so sometimes if they're very relaxed I will try putting them on their back and just see how they'll react to it now in the case of shadow which is the rat I have on screen right now she very much liked belly rubs and in fact she'd get so relaxed that she'd start turning over on her own and all I'd have to do is help her finish flipping and then she'd enjoy a very nice belly rub and you can see in this video she would move her little feet and she just would close her eyes and look so very peaceful and cute and happy so before I end this video I just wanted to cover just one more topic and that is that some rats might be a little too timid or skittish to feel safe cuddling outside of their comfort zone which would be like the cage or one of the boxes so what you can try in this case is you can try to place your rat inside your hoodie or you can try placing them inside a blanket or inside a snuggle pouch and seeing if they'll feel more comfortable in there and will be more happy to snuggle and let you pet them and then another alternative is just to pet them inside the cage I know that sometimes when my girls are feeling a bit sleepy and are sleeping out in one of their open hammocks I'll stick my hand in there and pet them for a few moments like you see on screen and usually they like it so they'll just sit there and they'll allow me to Stroke them a little bit and this lets you pet even those more hyper rats that are less prone to liking being petted or stroke because when they're in this P State they tend to like it more often than not so that's basically all I really wanted to say on this matter and just remember that if your rat doesn't seem to like being pet don't force it upon them you do want to continue to try to pet them as they age because many rats do tend to get cuddly as they get older but other than that you don't want to confine them to one space or force them to enjoy it because well you can't really force any animal to enjoy something and all you'll do is make the rat terrified of you and unhappy being in your presence so I hope this helped anyone who was wondering how exactly you could go about trying to scratch or pet your rats and I hope you enjoyed the video and the cute little clips of all my girls playing sweet little cuddly things and I hope to see you next time bye