mycoplasma/age

Question
Hello, my name is Jeannine and I've had my pet rat Gilbert for over 2 years now, he's the most amazing animal I've ever encountered and I am currently in school for my undergrad hoping to get into Vet school within the next few years. I'm not positive on Gilbert's exact age since the pet store we got him from didn't know but i expect it to be somewhere around 3. I'm very nervous about his life expectancy age and was wondering how old you've seen rats live until? As well as some signs to look out for. I've also done everything for these "red tears", he's been on every antibiotic over the past two years for the mycoplasma and his switched between them constantly, hes currently on a two month dosage of baytril right now. It just seems as if he's still sneezing constantly, the red discharge is all over his nose, and I want to be doing everything I can for him. I just wanted to see if I could get any extr opinion, the vet I take him to is great, but like I said am looking for any advice, especially since you've been working with them for 20 years. I was also interested in the far future once i earn my veterinary medicine degree to breed rats, in hopes I could reduce the problem of inbreeding among so many of them, which is known to cause most of the problems I have, do you have any experience on how to look into properly breeding for the future?
Thankyou

Answer

Bo and his red nose! Hello  Jeannine

For starters, normal life span is anywhere from 2 years to 4 years with 4 really pushing it. I have heard some people say their rat lived to be 5 but I have a super hard time believing there wasnt an error in keeping tabs on the rats age when they say the rat is 5.  I have had rats live to be almost 4 but never made it. Right now two of my oldest boys are 3 years and 6 months old. They are doing ok so far.  Its a bit funny you are mentioning porphyrin so perhaps what I have to say will make you feel a bit better about things. Since you have done research on porphryin you may know that these reddish colored secretions are from an excretory gland  behind the eyes called the harderian gland. Here is some more info on my site about it here:


Anyhow,normally, porphyrin is produced mainly to lubricate the rats nictating membrane (third eyelid)
When the rat is stressed from anxiety from illness or other factors that can raise the  stress levels, the harderian gland produces more porphyrin which is often used by the rat owner as an indication of illness. This is not always the case as some rats have an over abundance of porphryin and are totally healthy and stress free, and other rats that are gravely ill may produce none at all.  

As a matter of fact my boy Bo has had a nose loaded with porphyrin discharge his entire life and he is now 3 and a half years old. Here is a photo of him on here so you can see his red crusty nose. Now, if it were his eyes or he had other signs of illness such as lethargy etc...I would worry, but this is just something he does naturally.

As for breeding, the key to breeding is to keep a history of all of the rats you have as far as illness goes and also temperament, esp aggression issues.  These rats should not be bred. I am no breeder but you can reach another expert here, Janell or Robin, who  are both really good breeders as well as friends of mine too and I trust both of them.  

As for your rat and mycoplasmosis, is he on the baytril to prevent relapse?  usually after the second outbreak we put the rat on a daily dose of baytril for the rest of their life to prevent another attack since each attack causes damage to the lungs such as blistering and scarring.