sick wild rat?

Question
Hello,

Earlier tonight my boyfriend found a little rat huddled outside of our doorstep. The rat seemed very attached to our rubber woven mat and stuck his head inbetween the patterns almost like it was in search of a hole. The rat did seemed to stumble around, wasn't startled by our investigating, and seemed very confused. It seemed to be breathing hard and would shiver and my boyfriend said he heard it breathing rather hard. I really don't know how or why it found its way to our doorstep but I couldn't bear to set the poor thing out on its own when obviously I could tell it wasn't doing well. It was very partial to our rubber mat and when we tried to get it off to put it in a temporary container it grasped on for dear life. It seemed very clean and I didn't notice any fleas jumping about. If the poor thing survives the night, should I take the necessary steps to give it proper nourishment and take it to a vet? If it's wild is it possible to domesticate it?
Thank you very much!

Answer
Hi

THanks for having such a big heart. More than likely the rat was poisoned. It is so cruel to poison rodents, people should understand the suffering they go through but I guess they dont care. A well made snap trap that is sturdy and good quality to get the job done the first snap is probably the way to go if people want  to kill them, but the best way is to use a live trap and take them out and free them in the woods. Poisoning makes them suffer for hours :(   I know that you did not poison the rat, this is just random stuff for an FYI for others too.

If by some miracle she lives, you should find someone to take her today right away.  You can domesticate  a wild rat but it is not really the task for a novice rat owner.  I did it with an 11 week old wild rat and it took a week of constant work with her to trust train her. Getting a wild rat to trust people is a great task in itself since they are born to be Leary of all things living other than their own species since they are a source of food for many predators.
Your right, rats are clean and in fact they spend more time cleaning and grooming themselves than a cat does.  
Right now the key is to find someone that can care for her should she  survive .  A vet that takes wildlife...something like that. Let me know your location and I will get something going for you  if you want.

hang in there