Territorial or nervous or both

Question
We bought two rats for my son in February. They are both males and were bought together. From the start BW was the more outgoing and sociable. Fudge initially seemed quite shy then developed a habit of biting hands in the cage or anywhere near him on the outside of the cage (if he can). Credit to my son who has not let this put him off. He lets Fudge come out of the cage in his own time and where thats not possible he uses heavy gloves. Fudge has time out of the cage every day.

Now though he has started to bite outside of the cage. This is just recent and does seem to be if taken by surprise, for instance he just bit me when all I did was stroke him gently along his back but he was facing away from me at the time.

Since we got him, Fudge does seem to poop quite a bit when out of the cage and when being handled.

I am wondering if his behaviour is about being cage territorial or if he is just nervous, or both, and whether maybe castration would help.

Also if we have one castrated should we have them both done?

Many thanks

Answer
Hi Heather

Sounds like Fudge has some aggression problems which stems from poor breeding and poor socialization skills. Was he a pet store rat by chance?  
Either way, after all this time, he should at least trust his keeper. Lets see what is going on here:
For starters, rats are like newborn human babies. If the mother of the baby is nervous, the newborn picks up on it and often this causes a baby to be uneasy and fussy and they cry more. A nervous keeper can give the rat the same uneasy feeling and they do not have a sense of security.
Without security there is no trust and without trust there is no bonding.

The gloves  your son puts on to help protect him from rat bites, for starters, is a way to show your rat you do not trust him.
Rats rely heavily on their sense of smell because they have very poor vision. He cannot smell your son and touch his skin and therefore he is trying to actually focus in on a heavy glove instead with throws him totally off kilter.

The fact he has what is nick named "fear poop" when he is out of the cage means he is still very insecure with his surrounding's. Just like the saying goes...."You were so scared you____your pants"!   Same thing with ratties although they dont wear little bloomers and they get it on the carpet. ;)

Ok this is in bad taste and leading me down a non professional path so I will move along.....:)

Anyhow, several years ago I had heard a story about a pet store that had been given citations because they were selling wild rats as feeder rats. Some man found two nests of baby rats in his garage minus the mother, so he took both nests of babies to the pet store. The pet store turned around and tossed them in the feeder tank. When the man found this out he started telling people he knew that wanted rats to go buy them so they dont get sold as food and meanwhile, the authorties were hot on the trail because it was totally ILLEGAL to do that, period. A school teacher purchased one of the little wild females but of course, being not only a first time rat owner, she also had a wild hybrid on her hands, nothing like the domestic rats sold as pets. They are truly wild and scared to an uncontrollable frenzy if they were not handled as tiny babies, and of course they werent.
This little girl was about 8 weeks old at the time. Long story longer, the rat bit the teacher so hard she freaked out, went to the ER where the uneducated ER Doctor told her the rat may be rabid as he stitched up her hand *Never ever stitch a puncture wound from an animal bite, very bad to do, dumb doctor!* so the Teacher, who planned on using the rat for a class pet, freaks out, takes rat to dog pound, dog warden, also uneducated about rats, puts rat in rabies quarantine and planned on euthanasia in 10 days.  I find out about this, go to the dog pound, explain to the dog warden how it would be virtually IMPOSSIBLE for a baby rat to be rabid because for starters she was born in captivity in a garage and if she was bitten by a rabid animal, bitten PERIOD, she would be dead from the injuries from the bite wound. Skeptical, he called the State Vet who agreed with me 100% and they released the rat in my care, but did warn me that she is a terror.  
They were not kidding. Terror wasnt the word. We named her CHOMPS!  
Tiny, soft short fur that was brown with black ticking, with huge ears and wide slanted eyes, long muzzle and super long tail, she was a typical wild baby rat that was terrified of me and all that was around her. Knowing about behavior in rats, I put myself in her place like I have learned to do and figured out that I had to teach her to trust me first just by trusting her. We formed a bond for life after that and when she died, part of my heart went with her last July of 2007. She was just a few months shy of her 4th birthday.

I have all the information on how to train a biting or scared rat on my page here at this URL:
http://www.freewebs.com/crittercity/trainingshyorbitingrats.htm

I would try the trust training after you go over it, see how this works out. Neutering males works wonders with aggressive rats, esp if they are aggressive toward their cagemates.  However, I am not so sure this is true aggression and more simply fear and poor socialization which can be cured usually by patience and trust training. Soon after that, a great bond will form between rat and his keeper that cannot be broken till death parts you.

If it doesnt work and the rat is not living a happy life, I would consider neutering him. You do not need to neuter the other rat just because you neuter the other for aggression issues. I have a neuter and an intact rat with each other and there is no difference

Hope this helps. Sorry so long, I didnt mean to go on and on about Holly.