Diet question for rat keepers

I know with dog food, there is no standard for "puppy," "adult," and "senior," and it is 99% marketing -when there are differences it varies by company. I only ever raise mice, and when I do get a doorstep rat, it just gets to live out its life here. But my question is about "young rat," vs. "adult rat" food. I had a customer in with an old rat and all I had was "young rat" food in the Oxbow brand, so she wasn't comfortable buying it. From looking at the ingredient panels, they don't seem much different nutritionally. And Oxbow's rat care guide doesn't explain a thing. Is there really a nutritional need that the animals even have until they reach 6 months? And if so, what? Thanks.

Younger rats need to have more protein and fat than older rats.

Life stages in dog and cat food actually do make a difference, puppy/kitten has the most protein and fat, while senior has the least.

Oxbow young rat has 18% protein, which is somewhat high for an older rat, but not too high. Oxbow adult has 15% protein, which is better for non-breeding or older rats.

I feed Native earth, which has 18% protein, to all my rats and nobody has any reaction, even my non-breeding boys. It's when the protein is in the 20's that you start seeing reactions, which is mostly just rusting of the color unless your line of rats is really sensitive.

Thank you.

I do take some issue with this statement though:

Originally Posted by Kat_Dog

Life stages in dog and cat food actually do make a difference, puppy/kitten has the most protein and fat, while senior has the least.

Not in every brand. I can pull many bags of "senior" dog foods off of my shelf with higher protein and fat than another brands' puppy. And I'm sure if I had access to the ingredient panels of cereal based (grocery store) dog foods, I could find even more variability. Yes, lower protein and calories is a trend in senior foods, but it neither the case with every brand, nor what every older dog needs. From Whole Dog Journal:

Low Protein Myth

As dogs age, and kidney and liver disease becomes more common, you may hear that senior dogs need a low-protein diet, because high-protein foods puts too much stress on the kidneys/liver. (You often hear this with younger kidney-disease-prone dogs as well.) Vets may even suggest an expensive prescription diet with very little meat protein and a high carbohydrate count.

This is a myth!

In the early days of pet foods (and with many cheap foods now), most protein was derived from hard-to-digest sources such as by-products and corn meals. These protein sources, in high quantities, DID put a lot of stress on the kidneys, liver and the rest of the body, particularly for aging dogs whose digestive functions were slowing. Many vets, seeing these symptoms, recommended that their patients reduce the quantity of protein, rather than increase the quality, as they should have suggested.

Today, there are MANY wonderful brands of pet foods that are made with high-quality, easily digestible protein sources like muscle meat and organ meat. These proteins are easy for the body to process and do not require much work from the kidneys to filter out the junk. In fact, many dogs actually need more protein as they age in order to maintain healthy, lean muscle mass and good organ and immune function.

More info here: http://healthypets.mercola.com/sites...and-liver.aspx

So I was largely wondering if this was the same situation with rat food. Is there a needed dietary change between life stages, or is this largely marketing? I'll take your word that this 3% difference makes one food more appropriate for younger rats and mice, but with dogs and cats, individual variation has far greater impact on dietary needs than simply the pet's age.

I only buy grain free brands,(which are pretty much all life states) so my knowledge on cheap stuff is lacking. I've only ever looked at a few brands because I needed temp food for my rats.

The protein levels don't become a problem with rats until it's in the 20s, so you don't have to worry, even then, it really only causes color changes. Mice are the ones who get hot spots from high protein.


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I know you weren't suggesting this, but I don't sell anything cheap. I believe Solid Gold and Taste of the Wild are my least expensive dog foods per pound. Just saying this because I am comparing higher end grain free foods to get these comparisons.

Very interesting info on the color changes with high protein! Thanks!

I didn't even know you sold dog food lol
I don't have dog of my own, just my kitty who gets a very high quality grain free ($2.6/lb).
I agree with grain free life stages are gimmicks because the protein and fat are so high there's not point in having other life stages

As far as cheap brands go, they have to increase protein of puppy formulas because the adult ones are so full of fillers there's no way a puppy could grow correctly on that D:


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The consensus seems to be that younger rats & breeders need higher protein than adult non-breeders. That said, most feeder breeders feed something like Mazuri 6F (16% protein) or the Harlan Teklad/Native Earth x018 (18% protein), and report very good success with it, even when using it for adults that are getting a break between breedings. Then again, most feeder breeders don't have rats that are really "senior" or who never breed, just young to middle aged adults getting a break. So, it may not correspond to what a pet rat needs. Another variable is that lots of people give some sort of higher protein and/or fat supplement to pregnant and nursing females, but even the ones who don't do that are having good success with those feeds.

I'm pretty sure there ARE different needs at different life stages. Whether or not we KNOW what they are is a different question, although rats have been studied so much due to their use as laboratory animals I'd be a bit surprised if we don't have at least a pretty good idea. Another question is whether or not the needs are different enough that a different formula of food is needed. For example, a younger animal may need more calcium to support growing bones. But the extra calcium, while not needed by the older animal, may not be in any way harmful either.

Sorry, no real answers here, just speculation.

Interesting speculation, at least, KC. You are correct, scientists have probably studied laboratory rats as much or more than any species, one would expect they have their needs pretty nailed down. But I also know that pet food manufacturers market food to people, and not the pets. Royal Canin even sells "Bulldog forumla," which is presumably different from "Boxer formula." Because, these animals of the same species obviously have very different needs (insert sarcasm smiley here). It's not always easy to get to the truth, especially when the food manufacturers often fund their own studies. But from talking to the two of you, I feel confident that feeding Oxbow "young" rat and mouse to an adult rat isn't likely to cause any issues.