I am very sorry to tell you that our lovely little babies, whatever they were, have died. One during the night, one at mid day, and one this evening, even though my daughter carried it around in her breast pocket much of the day so that it could still stay warm without its buddies.
The kids are taking it hard, as we all did put in a lot of time and caring, even though only for a couple of days. We did do the "massage the tummy", and the last one was beginning to poop on his own and seemed to get stronger, and then this evening he began to have these strange spasms...
I'm so sad. My daughter is asleep, it's late... and I have not told her. She cried so much when the 2nd one died.
But they were so cute. Imagine that a cotton pad (the kind you might use for make-up) was like a big quilt for them....
I write from South Central British Columbia. We found them when at a riding camp in a semi-arrid region.(Did I mention that no mother showed up to claim the little squeakers over a generous period of time?) They may be pack rats, as the snout isn't as pointy as some of the other "wild" rats, I've seen.
I did look at the rat baby pictures on line, and the heads are different.
Anyway, must sleep. Thank you for your comments.
We've learnt quite a lot in this process. Perhaps we should have left them, they would have died, or been eaten, anyway. Well, for what it's worth, they died loved.
