Super Snacks & Healthy Treats for Pet Rats

Since rats gain weight easily—AND we want to feed them the healthiest foods possible—it’s important to choose pet rat treats that are:

• Low-Fat
• Low-Calorie
• Sugar Free
• Low Salt
• Organic
• Whole Foods

It’s also critical to not feed your rats too many treats. This can’t be emphasized enough. Your rats will always want more. Set limits such as 1-2 small treats a day unless you’re using them for training rewards. For training, choose lower calorie, smaller-sized options.

What to Avoid

Most treats sold in pet stores are junk food. They’re highly processed, contain sugar, preservatives, food colorings and they certainly aren’t organic.

The most popular pet rat treats available in stores are Yogies or Yogurt Drops. These treats have ingredients that definitely do NOT fit the above healthy guidelines. The first ingredient in any brand of yogurt drops is sugar! Besides all of the artificial ingredients, rats do not need dairy products. Almost every ingredient in store bought rat treats is the opposite of nutritious.

Whole Food Pet Rat Treats

Instead of Yogies, here are some organic, healthy, whole food treats your rats will love:

• Frozen Peas (thawed out)
• Grapes (absolutely must be organic as non-organic grapes are some of the most pesticide-laden produce)

—By the way, rats peel peas and grapes before eating them!—

• Cooked brown rice (organic) –  When used as a reward for training you can feed just one grain at a time. Since a single grain is consumed quickly, your rat can continue training without too much of a break. Feeding one grain at a time also helps keep your rat wanting more (rather than becoming too full) while your training session is in progress.
• Raw, unsalted sunflower seeds (give your rats a couple of them in the shell so it takes more time to eat them). On the other hand, if you’re unable to find them in the shell, snap unshelled sunflower seeds in half and feed them to your rats 1/2 at a time. (Also can work well as a training reward.)
• Small bits of walnut or cashew nuts. (Remember that almonds are not a good nut to feed rats. For more information on this, see Dangerous Foods for Pet Rats.)

Just about any healthy, whole food can be used as a treat as long as you keep the quantity super small.

Nutritious & Fun Packaged Rat Snacks

If you absolutely can’t resist buying packaged pet rat treats, here are some that are great for both humans and rats. Shopping information for all of these goodies can be found at the end of this post.

Cooked, Dried Beans

Dried chickpeas and edamame beans can be divided into halves or even fourths.

Seaweed

There are several brands and types of seaweed snacks available. Here are 2 that my pet rats love:

Tiger Nuts

These are actually tubers, not nuts. They’re very chewy and have a slightly sweet taste. Use a knife to chop up each tiger nut into at least quarters since they’re quite large. Even giving a rat just 1/4 of a tiger nut takes them awhile to eat.

Cheerios

Buy organic and sugar free. Cheerios work great as training rewards. When using for training, divide each Cheerio into eighths (—they snap apart fairly easily).

Rice Crackers or Rice Cakes

Little bits and pieces of these are good for noshing and nibbling.

WHERE TO FIND THESE TASTY TIDBITS ONLINE:

The Good Bean Chickpea Snack

The Only Bean – Crunchy Roasted Edamame Beans (Sea Salt)

GimMe Organic Roasted Seaweed Snacks (Teriyaki)

SeaSnax Chomperz Crunchy Seaweed Chips

Organic Raw Tigernuts

365 Everyday Value Organic Morning O’s

Lundberg Family Farms Thin Stackers – Brown Rice

Lundberg Family Farms Unsalted Organic Brown Rice Cakes

A few other wholesome treats rats love

The following treats must be fed VERY sparingly (no more than once or twice weekly):

• Coconut chips
• Pumpkin seeds (raw, unsalted)
• Banana chips (very small pieces)
• Whole roasted peanuts in the shell – Rats love opening the shells and getting out the peanuts.

Special Note: Some people give their rats walnuts (or other hard nuts) in the shell and think this is fine for them. In my opinion, walnut shells are too hard for pet rats to chew on. I heard my rats chewing on a whole walnut once and it sounded like they were going to break their teeth!

There are so many possibilities when it comes to pet rat treats. Keep in mind, however, that food is not the same as love. Petting, praising and playing with our rats are the healthiest pet rat treats of all.