rat emotions

Question
I use to have four rats, but two weeks ago two of them unexpectedly passed away from pneumonia. Two of my rats, Denali and Kate, were really good friends and would always stick together. Unfortunately Kate was one of the rats that passed away. Does Denali realizes Kate is gone? Can rats feel grief for their lost friends? She seems a little more lethargic lately so i was wondering if she could be depressed at all.

Answer
Hi Lindsey

First of all, I am sorry for your loss.

As for your question, yes, absolutely, rats can tune into emotions of all sorts. From the loss of their cagemate to even being moved to a new cage, rats express their emotions through various actions.
Depression is a major problem for lone rats, especially those that lose their cage mate. What often occurs is the rat becomes depressed from missing their cagemate which in turn the stress causes the immune system to weaken. When this happens, the rat becomes ill and we often associate this illness with that of the deceased rat but it is usually unrelated.  Rats will stop eating and basically stop caring. They withdraw and become lethargic. This doesnt happen all the time, mind you, but it does occur often when a rat loses a cagemate.  One of the reasons is that they are waiting for them to return.  Studies show that if a rats cagemate dies and they get the chance to "bury it" they tend to have closure and they are able to move on because they are aware of the fact the other rat was dead. This sounds outrageous and I am sure many non rat owners (or even some rat owners) are shaking their head in disbelief that a rat can really have this type of thought process, but never underestimate the rat.  They are used in the lab more than any other animal for this very reason. Intelligence and the astonishing thought process they have when others consider them to just be primitive thinking vermin.

Sorry to blab on about everything but I always find this interesting when I talk about how rats can tune into emotions of many kinds.

Same applies for biting rats. I have had many people write in about their rats that nip or bite and they are scared of it and want to know how to change it. The first thing is to STOP fearing the rat. They pick up on your fear and this just snowballs from there.

Hope this helps!